


Not Right Now

by ceterisparibus



Series: Ella [2]
Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Character Study, F/M, Human Disaster Matt Murdock, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Legal Drama, Matt Murdock & Foggy Nelson Friendship, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-19
Updated: 2018-11-28
Packaged: 2019-08-25 17:34:12
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 30,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16665193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ceterisparibus/pseuds/ceterisparibus
Summary: Matt works on some serious cognitive dissonance for the sake of helping six-year-old Ella. Sequel to "I'm Not That Strong (Honestly, I'm Not)."





	1. Trouble Always Draws a Crowd

Karen

It was one of those places that made Karen finger her gun in her bag. Dimly lit with too many dark corners, run-down storefronts without enough windows. And, of course, no one was around to hear if she screamed.

Except the one person who mattered.

“Hey.” Matt was waiting for her in the open doorway, a shadow among darker shadows, and she didn’t need the gun to feel safe anymore. “You sure about this?”

“If excited and nervous means sure, then yeah, I’m sure.”                                                                                             

“You’ll do great.” He gestured inside. “C’mon.”

She flicked on the lights as she followed him into Fogwell’s, revealing that he was wearing sweats and a hoodie. He was also barefoot, but he silently moved down the hall without any visible concern for whatever might be on the floor. She followed, and her sneakers weren’t squeaking, but she was still acutely conscious of every sound she made.

She followed him into the main gym and tried not to think of the last time she’d been there, learning about Agent Nadeem’s death while Foggy panicked over the possibility that Matt would kill Fisk. “I’m still disappointed I couldn’t convince Foggy to come,” she said, just making conversation to distract herself from her thoughts.

He threw her a smirk. “I don’t know, I kind of don’t mind that it’s just us.”

Technically, this wasn’t a date. But Matt had a habit of turning things into dates whenever she least expected. She glanced around, but there were no flowers sticking out of lockers or anything else cheesy. Just Matt.

“Don’t get distracted,” she warned. “We’re here to work.”

“Good.” He was obviously trying to match her level of seriousness, but his lips kept twitching.

Ignoring that, she rubbed her hands together. She’d asked if he could teach her some self defense a week or so ago and they’d finally found time in their busy schedules. “Okay, so…how do we start?”

He tilted his head, eyes aimed somewhere over her left shoulder. “You know how to make a fist?”

She curled her fingers in, keeping her thumb on the outside. She knew that much at least.

“Hmm.” Drawing closer, he ran his fingers over hers. “Tuck your thumb in.”

“What, under my fingers?”

“Over, but across.” He folded it so it was angled instead of sticking up straight. “Otherwise, you could jam it or snag it on something.”

“None of the YouTube videos talked about that.”

“You’ve been watching videos on this?” His eyes narrowed slightly.

“Should I not have?”

“Well, no, not necessarily. But I might teach you some things that are, ah, different. I don’t want you to get confused.”

“Okay,” she said slowly. “No more YouTube.”

“Unless you can find a really cool playlist for practice.” The smirk was back, this time because they both knew her musical tastes drove him crazy. And vice versa.

She tapped her knuckles against his nose. “What’s next?”

“Well, I need to teach you the basics of a good stance. That’s pretty crucial. But first, I’d rather show you the best targets because that has a broader range of utility. If you have a weapon, your stance won’t matter so much.”

She guessed he wasn’t referring to her gun. What, then, did he expect someone to jump here while she was hanging out around a bunch of crowbars? Maybe this was all a ploy to get her to avoid Home Depot. But targets sounded more fun than footwork, so she wasn’t complaining.

“Before we get into this, though…” He trailed his hand down her arm. “I want to test something. Do you trust me?”

In other circumstances, she might’ve responded ironically. But though the smirk lingered, there was an intensity in his eyes that she wanted to respect. “Yeah, Matt. I do.”

“Good. I just need to see how you’ll react.”

That was all the warning she got before his hand tightened like a vice around her wrist and he twisted her arm behind her back, jerking her against him and pinning her to his chest with his other arm across her throat.

Instinctual fear jolted through her and she threw herself against his hold to absolutely no effect. Then she smashed her head backwards, trying to hit his face.

She missed because he was no longer there. He’d released her in a flash and by the time she whipped around, he was about three feet away.

“Nice,” he said.

“You idiot! What was _that_?” She rotated her wrist and her shoulder. It wasn’t actually sore, but it felt like it should be.

“Just testing something. First rule: don’t try to brute force your way out of things. That would’ve really hurt you if I’d kept a tighter grip on your arm.”

“I wasn’t trying to _brute force_ my way out.” But she remembered the way his arms had trapped her so thoroughly, how all of her body weight had failed to break his grasp. “Okay, fine. I wasn’t thinking.”

“Exactly. I just needed to know what you’d do. Using your head was a much better idea, and feel free to take that both ways.”

Why, exactly, had she agreed to this?

“But I have some ideas for how we can refine your instincts, redirect them.” He pulled his hoodie over his head, leaving him in just a tank top.

Right. That was why.

“You’re staring,” he chided her, sliding smoothly under the ropes to the ring.

“You’re incorrigible.”

“Yeah,” he agreed flippantly, “but that’s not why you’re staring.”

Well, two could play at that game. Standing just outside the mat, she held out her hand and waited until he helped her up onto the platform and under the ropes. While his hand was still holding hers, she brushed her finger lightly against the underside of his wrist where she knew he was sensitive.

He dropped her hand with an annoyed flicking motion, but she was pleased to see him flushing slightly. “Thought we were here to work.”

“We are,” she said innocently. “You sure you’re up for it, though? You look a little feverish or something.”

His eyes glinted dangerously. “C’mon.” He didn’t take her hand again; apparently he’d learned his lesson. Instead, he took her firmly upper arm and pulled her to the center of the mat. “So. Targets. Throat is good because it’ll almost always be in range if you’re already up close. Groin works too, although that’s less effective if your opponent is wearing an athletic cup.”

“Do people just walk around in athletic cups?” she asked skeptically. Maybe he was in fact trying to tell her to stay away from baseball games.

“Uh, no. So, yeah, targeting the groin should be pretty reliable. The knees are even better, though, because if you can take out a knee, no amount of pain tolerance will change the fact that your enemy can no longer walk.”

“What about the eyes?”

“The nose is actually better. If you strike the nose, the watering eyes will temporarily blind your enemy, but you get the added bonus of extra pain and lots of blood.”

“Ooh, bonus,” she said sarcastically.

“But the _real_ trick—” he threw her a wicked grin, “—is hitting several of those sensitive targets in rapid succession. Not only is your opponent in pain, but the brain is literally overwhelmed from signals from the nervous system. If you’re lucky, your attacker will just throw up.”

He had a weird definition of luck. “Have you ever done that?”

She meant to ask whether he’d ever done that to someone else, but Matt took her question at face value. “My teacher, he did it to me a couple of times. Made sure I really got the lesson. The last time it happened, I’d just broken my ribs about five weeks before.” He laughed. “I learned pretty quick after that.”

That didn’t quite add up. “Did your teacher know your ribs were broken?” she asked casually.

Matt scoffed. “He’s the one who did it.”

“Foggy said you were ten!”

He seemed to realize too late that maybe this story wasn’t as amusing as he seemed to think. “Oh. Yeah. Like I said, I learned.” He cleared his throat. “If you get the chance, try to…”

But she wasn’t listening. She was staring at him, this man who was taller than she was and twice as thick, this man she’d personally seen fight for her on four different occasions, this man who frightened people like Wilson Fisk…but all she could see was a little kid whose teacher was hurting him.

Fingers snapped by her ear and she jumped. Matt had his head cocked all the way to the side. “Did I lose you?”

“I’m sorry,” she blurted out before she could think better of it.

His lips twitched again. “For?”

She knew how he felt about pity, and for now, he probably thought she was just overly apologetic for zoning out. She could run with that; better he thought that than knew the truth.

But she was too late. His expression was already hardening. “Karen, that was years ago.”

“I know,” she said quickly. “I know.”

“It’s done; I’m fine. And I am who I am because of it.”

He clearly thought that was a robust endorsement.

“I know. I’m thankful.” And she was, to the extent that his training had given him the abilities to save her life on at least three different occasions. Beyond that, though…she knew without a doubt that the goodness and selflessness in Matt was his own, not the product of any training. He didn’t owe that to anyone. But could he see that for himself? “I didn’t mean to get distracted. Show me what you were showing me again.”

He complied, highlighting the optimal order of targeted strikes. She very carefully paid attention and he very carefully avoided any further mention of his teacher.

 

“Can I order you something?” He let her into his apartment. When he actually remembered to switch on the light for her, it did funny things to her stomach.

“I’m not hungry, but thanks.” It was odd; after working out, she felt like she should be hungry. But she felt lighter on her feet and more energetic than she had in months. Part of that might’ve been due to the actual exercise. Most of it was probably due to confidence borne of learning yet another way to protect herself. Regardless, she didn’t want to deaden the feeling with Thai food.

“Suit yourself. But you should drink more water.”

“Yes, mom.” She refilled her bottle and went to sit on the couch, but she stopped when she passed the closet. It was open and she could see a piece of paper sitting on the chest where he kept his Daredevil gear. She glanced over her shoulder; he was getting some beer for himself (hypocrite), giving her the chance to pick it up.

Oh. It was the list of bad decisions he’d made with Foggy. Or Foggy had made for him. She still wasn’t really sure whose initiative had started the project. For all that she’d told them she’d be approving the list, she hadn’t actually said anything when Matt had disappeared at the end of the day, the paper in his pocket and not a word said.

He appeared beside her. “Something caught your attention?”

“It’s nothing,” she said quickly. “Just, um, that paper. The list.”

He gave a strange laugh. “The Bad Decision Spectrum. Of course.”

“I didn’t—I wasn’t looking or anything, I just—”

“You could, though,” he said quietly. “If you want. Not like I can see what it says anyway. You may as well, uh, refresh my memory.”

If he couldn’t see it, maybe he didn’t actually know what he was asking. “You sure?”

In answer, he picked up the paper and dropped it in her hand, then walked resolutely to the couch.

She joined him, tucking her feet up under her to sit closer beside him. Most of the items were silly. Apparently consuming any variation of Twilight literature counted as a bad decision, but Matt was allowed to do it without any discussion. Foggy had, at some point, tried to add “eating cilantro” to the list, but Matt must have scratched it out. Foggy had apparently won on the dog argument, because “getting a dog” was placed firmly in the “must-discuss-with-more-than-one-person” category.

Then there were the decisions he couldn’t make without explicit permission. Oddly, “Keeping secrets about stuff found while Daredeviling” was on the list, although she wasn’t totally sure how Matt was supposed to go about getting explicit permission for secret-keeping. “Visiting Elektra’s grave” was also there, which…Karen really didn’t know how to feel about that.

Then there was the last category. The bad decisions he wasn’t allowed to make at all, for any reason.

_Avoiding Foggy, Karen, or Maggie._

  _Killing anyone._

_Suicide._

Her finger lingered over the last one. She’d kind of expected Foggy to include something ridiculous as a joke, but he hadn’t. This part of the list, at least, was serious.

“Matt?”

His head kind of twitched as he refocused on her. “Which part are you looking at?” Then he gave a little nod, as if to himself. “The last part, right? What do you think?”

She didn’t know. That was the problem. “I think you should definitely not do any of these things,” she said airily.

“Good. Then we all agree.” He couldn’t quite disguise the relief on his face, relief that she hadn’t made this into…a thing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The disparaging Twilight reference reflects Foggy's thoughts and not my own.


	2. They Just Can't Seem to Understand

Matt

He spent so much time keeping an eye on Everett’s at three in the morning that every time he visited during the day, he needed a second to adjust. There was usually a child or two crying from some nightmare when he listened in while on patrol, but for the most part the place was simply filled with soft breathing. Definitely not so in daylight.

But he picked out Ella’s heartbeat and tied his senses to it. Grounded, he tapped his way inside.

Mr. Burnham was at the front desk. “Mr. Murdock! Good to see you.”

“Please, call me Matt.” Every time.

“Here for Ella?”

He wrapped both hands around the top of his cane. “Am I that predictable?”

“You and Mr. Nelson both. And I can’t thank either of you enough for it.”

“The attorney fees help,” Matt said cavalierly. They all knew the fees had nothing to do with it. At least not for Matt. Foggy probably appreciated them a bit more, but it wasn’t like they expected this case to pay many bills.

Mr. Burnham led him to a common playroom with a jolly, “Ella! Someone’s here to see you.”

She was surrounded by a cluster of other little girls. She looked up, and Matt noted the instant she saw him because she leapt to her feet with a dramatic gasp. “Matt!”

“Hi.” He couldn’t keep the grin off his face, even though he knew Burnham was watching him.

She raced across the room, giving him about two seconds to drop down and catch her before she crashed into his knees. Normally wouldn’t be a problem, but he was a little sore from taking a baseball bat to the leg a few days ago. “You came back!”

Every time. “You said you had an idea you wanted to show me.”

“I thought of it all by myself!” She jumped out of his arms, grabbed his hand, and pulled him into a corner of the room. Thankfully not the corner with all the other girls. Matt had met them one by one over his visits to Everett’s, but he tried to avoid them when they were all congregated in a pack like that.

Ella led him to a small table low to the ground that smelled strongly of…something gross and oily. Sitting cross-legged on the ground in front of it, he focused on not wrinkling his nose. “What’s your idea?”

“Finger painting!”

He raised his eyebrows. “You know I still can’t see it.”

“But you can feel it, right?”

He’d…never actually finger painted anything since his abilities developed. Not that he was going to admit that. “Yeah. Probably.”

“Good,” she said proudly. “I lined up all the colors in a row. Do you remember the rainbow?”

Did he remember—a picture flashed in his mind, not one built of sounds and smells. It was an actual image: misty blue sky and the sun shining through it, lighting up streaks of red and orange and green. Matt blinked. “Uh, yeah. Actually.”

“Do you remember the order? _I_ know the order.”

“Maybe you’d better remind me.”

“Red, orange, yellow, green, blue, blue, violet!”

Matt laughed. “Are you sure there are two blues?”

“Yes,” she said stubbornly. “The other color’s just a fancy name for blue.”

He of all people was in no position to argue. “Okay,” he said simply.

She took his hand—maybe one day he’d stop delighting in the impossible softness of her skin, but not today—and tapped the tips of his fingers against the lips of nine small bowls, naming each color as she went, starting with black before moving to the rainbow colors and ending with white. “If you forget, you can just ask,” she wanted him to know. “And remember: you have to always wipe your finger off before you switch colors, or it’ll get all mixed up.”

“You’re a good teacher.”

“Teacher,” she echoed thoughtfully.

Something jolted through him. The idea of her in college, taking education classes. The idea of her in a classroom of her own, surrounded by little kids. Foggy would be crushed—he was counting the years until she was old enough to intern at their firm—but Matt couldn’t get this new idea out of his head.

It was stupid. She was just six. But she had a whole future awaiting her, a future only God could know at this point, and if there was one single thing he could do that would help get it for her, he’d do it.

He suddenly wished he could ask his dad if this was how he’d felt so many years ago.

To distract himself, he quickly stuck his finger in the paint that he thought was black and started drawing.

“What’s that?” She pointed at his paper.

“Oh, um. I’m not sure yet.”

“You shouldn’t have started with black,” she said reproachfully. “It’s gonna be really hard to paint on top of it without everything smearing together.”

Whoops. “I, uh…”

She cocked her head. “It kind of looks like a dog. Maybe. A fat black dog?”

Matt laughed. “Let’s go with that.”

“Do _you_ have a dog?”

Unfortunately, Foggy was insistent enough that it seemed like an inevitability at this point. “Not yet,” he said without thinking.

“But you _will?_ ” Ella let out a little shriek. “A puppy? What’s his name? What does he look like? I want a dog! We used to have a dog but someone killed him because my dad made them mad.”

Wait, what? Matt missed the bowl of paint and accidentally jabbed his finger on the table, probably leaving a black streak. “Someone killed your dog?”

“I was only four,” she said in a voice that suggested she had no memory of that fact. “Mommy said I cried, but I don’t remember anything. But I’ve seen pictures. His name was Rocky and he was _really_ cute. I wish I could have a dog, but they can’t keep dogs here.”

Crap. Maybe he was getting a dog after all.

“Matt, you’re mixing all the colors.”

“Sorry.”

“You have to clean your finger off before switching colors, remember?”

“Yeah, sorry.” He sat back while she wiped off his hand and squirted clean paint into the bowl on top of whatever mixed-up color he’d created.

“Maybe if I get adopted, we can have a dog,” she said suddenly.

Adoption. He hadn’t…it seemed incredibly shortsighted now, but he’d been so focused on securing her place at Everett’s that he hadn’t even thought about the possibility of adoption. “Is that…something you want?”

“I miss Mommy. But it’d be nice to have a mom that isn’t always in trouble. Or a dad that’s nice to me. You know?”

Matt licked his lips. “Ella,” he began carefully, “remember how I told you that I stayed at a place like this when I was a kid?”

At the time, he’d expected her to be excited at discovering yet another thing they had in common. Instead, her eyes had filled with tears and she hadn’t ever explained why. He didn’t want to upset her again by bringing it up now, but he had to warn her. Who else would?

She just nodded silently. She often forgot that he couldn’t see her nodding, but no one was paying them enough attention to notice that he noticed.

“I was at St. Agnes’ for nine years and it wasn’t that bad. But the thing is, someone sort of tried to adopt me once.” If you could call training with Stick adoption. “The man who wanted me didn’t want me for the right, uh, reasons. He ended up leaving and I had to go back to St. Agnes’.”

She’d stopped painting, her attention now focused entirely on him. “I’m so _sorry_ , Matt.”

“It’s okay. I just want you to know that…you’re an amazing little girl, Ella, and a lot of people might want you for, um…not the right reasons. So I want you to be careful, okay?”

“Okay,” she said seriously, sinking down a little in her chair.

Matt chewed on the inside of his cheek. “I mean, there are good people out there,” he added, though it seemed kind of inconsequential at this point.

“I like it here.” Her voice got a little louder. She was trying to be brave.

“Yeah.” He shouldn’t have said anything. He shouldn’t have said anything. “This is a good place.”

For a while after that, they were quiet as they painted. Matt tried to get a read on her, on what she was thinking, but he couldn’t tell if she was lost in thought or absorbed in her project.  He wished he’d chosen something a bit more ambitious because he finished a rough outline of a dog long before she finished her art, so he had to resort to doodling around the edges, careful not to blur the doodles into the actual picture.

“All done,” she finally announced. “I made the world I told you about, where the mountains are made of ice cream and the people sing whenever they talk.”

One of about ten worlds he’d learned about so far. “Can I see?”

“No!” She pushed at his hands when he reached for it. “You have to let the paint dry first.”

That was definitely something he should’ve thought of. “Sorry, Ella. I’m not good with paint.”

She made a slight humming noise as she leaned over to inspect his picture. “Yeah, I can tell.”

“Hang on,” he spluttered, but of course he had no actual way to defend the quality of his art.

While they waited for the paintings to dry, she told him about another world, the eleventh. In this one, people walked on the sky and looked up at trees and everyone always ate meals together, no matter what. He knew better than to reach again, so he waited for her to delicately take his hand and place it over her painting.

And oh, she _was_ brilliant. It wasn’t just that he could more easily do the painting himself. He could also feel all the textures, all the little grooves and clumps from the layers of paint stacked on each other. Maybe he couldn’t distinguish colors, but he thought with practice he’d be able to build a sort of three-dimensional picture.

“Hey, Ella. Could you do something for me sometime? You don’t have to.”

“I wanna do it.”

She didn’t even know what it was yet. How was she this precious? “Could you paint me a picture of Foggy? And nothing else. Just Foggy. So I can…feel him.” That sounded weird and he was immensely thankful that Foggy wasn’t around to hear it.

 

Foggy

Foggy preferred to drag Matt along when he went to visit Ella. There was something heartwarming abbot the way Matt moved around her, constantly reorienting himself around her. And everything about him became loser, more relaxed. The closest Foggy could compare it to was when they slept in after staying up late on a Friday night—studying, because Matt forced him into it. They’d wake up slowly, carelessly, because they’d gotten done everything they’d been supposed to the night before and now they didn’t have to worry about anything.

That sounded really sappy and Matt would probably not be thrilled to know Foggy thought that way at all, but until his freaky senses enabled him to read minds, Foggy was keeping that secret to himself.

Still, every once in a while their case load was such that Foggy visited Ella on his own. Today was one of those days.

“And we finger-painted because that way Matt can feel all the colors!”

That didn’t sound quite right, but he wasn’t going to argue with either her or Matt’s senses.

“See?” She brandished her painting. “It’s you, Foggy!”

Well, with a lot of imagination, that was definitely a possibility. The shape was lumpy and roundish and the hair looked awful and he couldn’t figure out if the blob in the center of the face was supposed to be his nose or his mouth or maybe both together. “It looks just like me.”

“Matt said he wanted to feel you!”

A grin spread across his face. “Oh, _did_ he?” He was never letting Matt live that down. “Maybe you should paint Karen instead.”

“Why? Who’s Karen?”

“Never mind,” he said quickly. Do not scar the small child.

“And Matt said he’s getting a dog!”

 _Did_ he? This little girl was a treasure. “Wow, Ella. Did you get that in writing, by chance?”

She wrinkled her forehead in confusion. “Writing?”

“Never mind. What else did he say?”

She started rattling off all the things Matt had told her, mostly unimportant stuff, until she circled back to the dog thing. “And I thought if I get adopted maybe I could have a dog, but he said I have to be careful because some people who wanna adopt me are bad.”

Foggy almost choked on his own spit. “He said that?”

“Uh-huh. Because someone who adopted him once was bad and he had to come back and didn’t get to have a family or anything.”

Trying to ignore the startling fact that Matt had apparently used the term _adoption_ to refer to Stick, Foggy shifted closer to her and put his hand on her shoulder; she was small enough that his fingers touched almost halfway down her back. “Ella, pumpkin, you don’t have to worry about bad people adopting you.”

“But Matt said—”

“Matt had a really bad experience, but that’s not normal.”

Her brow furrowed.

“Do you want to have a new Mommy and Daddy?”

Her lower lip trembled minutely. She nodded once.

“Then I don’t want you to worry about whether they’ll be good or not. You don’t have to be scared about that.”

“’M not scared,” she said stubbornly.

Could they _be_ more alike. “Ella, do you trust Mr. Burnham and Miss Alice?”

Another nod.

“Good, because they’re really good people and they really, really like you. They’re not gonna let anyone bad come and get you.”

She blinked up at him. “Foggy, are you sure?”

“Yeah, pumpkin. I’m super sure.”

 

Foggy burst into the office trying not to look like he was on the warpath. But who was he kidding? Matt could definitely tell. Karen, meanwhile, was nowhere in sight. Good: she couldn’t judge him. Bad: she couldn’t back him up. Because she’d definitely be on his side for this.

Matt popped out of his office like a startled meerkat. “Did something happen with Ella?”

“Yeah.” Foggy dropped his coat on the floor. “She told me some of the stuff you said.”

Matt groaned loudly. “Not the feeling-pictures-of-you thing. Fogs, you know I didn’t mean it like that.”

“That’s definitely not what I’m talking about. Who do you think you are, telling her bad people want to adopt her?”

His head tilted to the side and he raised his eyebrows in a silent question.

“Don’t play dumb with me, Matt. Now she doesn’t want to get adopted!”

“Of course she does,” he said patiently, like Foggy was the crazy one. “But now she’s going to be more careful about it.”

How dare he put that weight on her. “She shouldn’t have to be afraid of every potential new family!”

“Not afraid, Foggy,” Matt said earnestly. “Cautious.”

Foggy wished Karen were in the room to hear all this. “She’s _six_.”

“Which only makes her more vulnerable.”

“That’s not the point! This isn’t her responsibility!”

“Oh, yeah?” His glasses glinted in the harsh LED light that they needed to replace immediately. “Whose is it? Everett’s? Because they’re a good institution, Foggy, with good people. But kids fall through cracks all the time.”

“That’s not the _point_.”

His tone sharpened. “Spell it out for me because I’m missing it.”

“It’s…” He shouldn’t have to spell this out. “It isn’t her job to worry about this. She’s a little girl; she should be thinking about all her made-up worlds and worried about whether they’re serving broccoli for dinner.”

“That’s a lot of faith you’re putting in an institution, Foggy.”

“At least I’m not scaring her!”

His eyes eyebrows drew closer together. “Is she scared?”

“Yes!” Foggy exclaimed, then immediately weakened his point by tacking on, “A little.”

“A little fear can be a good thing,” Matt said flatly. “It keeps people from making stupid mistakes. The people at Everett’s might love Ella, but she’s just one kid. They’re responsible for a hundred others. Ella needs to take responsibility for her own security, and the sooner she realizes that, the better.”

“The sooner she loses her childhood, you mean.”

“There are far worse ways to lose your childhood.”

Foggy fought not to lose focus. “Matt, listen,” he began. “You have a very different perspective from mine. Different from most people’s, actually.”

“Is that a blind joke, a senses joke, or a tragic backstory joke?”

Foggy floundered and carved himself an out. “All of them, I guess.”

Matt clearly didn’t buy it. “Listen to me very carefully, Foggy. My life wasn’t great growing up and you know it. But Stick _helped_ me. He protected me from far worse things. Wanna know how I know?”

Not particularly.

“I heard things. At St. Agnes’. People coming and taking kids. I could hear what they were saying before and after and, yeah, some of them were good people. But as for the bad ones, you just hoped they were only in it for the money, because that was better than some of what I heard.”

Foggy suppressed a shiver. “That being said, that was over twenty years ago. They’re better at tracking people now.”

“Oh, really. You wanna take that chance with Ella?”

No. The thought of any of that happening to her…it made him feel actually sick. And helpless. And guilty. “I just don’t get why you have to force _her_ into nightmares about the worst-case scenarios. At least we can both agree that the people at Everett’s are looking out for her.” He paused for another sickening second. “Right? You haven’t…heard anything?”

Matt gave an angry twitch of his head. “Good people still make mistakes. I’m not apologizing for what I told Ella, Foggy. If you can guarantee her safety—I mean _guarantee_ it—then go tell her she has nothing to worry about. I’d rather she keep her guard up.” Foggy opened his mouth but couldn’t think of a rebuttal in time. “Better that than the alternative.”

His door slammed shut.


	3. Their Words are Salt in an Open Wound

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Matt deposes (basically cross-examines) Mr. Conway. His history of sexual abuse comes up, though not graphically. It's the last line of questioning so you can skip that if you want.

Matt

Mr. and Mrs. Conway were both separately challenging the Everett’s court-given permission to keep Ella without taking further steps to reunite her with her parents. Their determination was unlikely to last all the way to trial, but for now, it gave Matt and Foggy no choice but to keep fighting.

Matt met Foggy at a modest law firm downtown, Hayes and Brown, to depose Mr. Conway. They exchanged no apologies, wordless or otherwise, after their previous argument, but Matt was confident neither of them would let lingering bitterness interfere. This was about Ella, not their differences.

Mr. Conway’s attorney, Hayes, ushered them into the conference room. “Let’s get the necessary stipulations out of the way. The witness will read and sign the deposition. Mr. Conway will waive the notarization. We reserve all objections.”

Matt could practically feel Foggy rolling his eyes. “Sorry,” Foggy said. “Let’s stick to the actual rules, shall we?”

“You don’t agree to the usual stipulations?”

“If you have any objections to this process, you can make them now, not reserve them for trial.”

“If that’s how we’re playing.” Hayes adjusted her skirt; fingers slicking over the silk material. “Mr. Conway, I’m going to ask some questions that I’d like you to answer as accurately as possible. If you don’t understand, feel free to ask me to rephrase or repeat.”

Conway nodded.

“Please state your full name and spell the last for the record.”

So it began.

 

After two hours of direct examination which attempted to paint Mr. Conway in a flattering light but mostly just succeeded at rehashing the Conway Christmas traditions (which might be abstractly heartwarming if considered in isolation, but were disturbing in light of the facts of Conway’s relationship to his daughter—and other minors), they broke for lunch and separate strategy sessions. Matt and Foggy clustered around a small table, sharing notes.

“I didn’t think it was possible to hate this guy more than I already do.”

“Are you saying I should do the questioning, then?” Matt asked hopefully.

“I mean, I already made him piss his pants when I served him notice. I guess it’s your turn.”

“What color are his pants today? Please tell me they’re white.”

“Oh, they are. Shockingly so.”

Matt wished he could confirm, wished he could see Foggy’s face, wished they could exchange actual grins. He settled for holding out his hand for a fist bump.

They all reconvened at the end of the break, Matt and Foggy taking up seats across from Conway and Hayes.

Matt launched straight into things. “How tall are you, Mr. Conway?”

There was a wet sound as his lips pulled back in what Matt could only assume was a smirk. “About six one.”

“And how much do you weigh?”

“Over two hundred.”

The man was bragging. Matt threw in a new question. “Do you work out regularly, Mr. Conway?”

“Every morning except Sundays. That’s the Lord’s day, also known as NFL Sunday.”

Matt could only imagine how frustrated Hayes was with this blundering deponent. “And how old are you?”

“Does that matter?”

“Answer the question, please. If you don’t understand, let me know and I can rephrase.”

His blood pressure spiked. Perfect. “I’m forty-two. And a half, if that matters to you.”

“Thank you.” Matt allowed a flash of a smile. “Mr. Conway, how old is your daughter?”

“Six.” Conway sounded confused now, trying to figure out what Matt was looking for.

“And how tall is she?”

There it was. A hint of nervousness. “I don’t know.”

“Guess. Or, if numbers aren’t your thing, just tell us about how high she comes up to you. Maybe the top of her head reaches your hip?”

“Three foot something. Maybe four.”

She was three foot nine. “The average weight of a six-year-old female in the United States is forty-five pounds. Does that sound about right for Ella?”

“I don’t know. Sure, I guess.”

“Great.” Nice to get his awareness of those details on record; a better witness could confirm Ella’s exact measurements later. Matt switched to a new line of questioning. “Now, I understand that Ella says you strike her because she deserves it. Why—”

“Objection,” Hayes cut in. “Hearsay.”

Matt turned his face in her direction. “Don’t waste my time. Hearsay isn’t a problem if we depose Ella later.” He and Foggy would fight tooth and nail to keep that from happening, but Hayes didn’t need to know that. He turned back to Conway. “Why did you think she deserved to be hit?”

“She was disobedient.”

“How so?”

“I don’t recall all the specific times.”

“ _All_ the specific times? How many?”

“I just told you, I don’t—”

“What about any specific time, then, Mr. Conway. Do you remember any particular instance?”

He looked at his attorney.

“Answer the question,” she said crisply.

“I guess I hit her once ’cause she was slow getting ready for school.”

Matt felt his lips curl into something like a smile. “And that sped things right up, did it?”

“We got to school on time.”

“Did she cry?”

“She cries a lot.” Matt opened his mouth and he quickly said, “Yeah, probably, she cried.”

“What did you hit her with, Mr. Conway?”

“Uh. My hand?”

“Open or closed fist?”

“I don’t _remember_.”

Fine. “Did Ella know to expect you to hit her if she was slow getting ready for school?” It was a trap question. If she did know, that made the abuse a repeated occurrence. If not—

“I guess not.”

“Did you discuss the discipline with her, prior to her disobedience?”

“No. It just happened.”

“It just happened,” Matt repeated softly. “Did you try any other form of discipline first?”

“Not that I recall.”

“Let me make sure I understand. Your six-year-old daughter is slow getting ready for school. You, Mr. Conway, can think of no other form of discipline that might be appropriate except to hit her, open-hand, without any warning.”

“Wasn’t open-hand.” He knew how bad that sounded, was obviously trying to poke holes in the scene Matt created. He should’ve left it alone.

“Closed fist, then?” Matt let the words hang for a moment. “Answer the question. You seem pretty confident that it wasn’t open-handed, even though just a second ago you said you didn’t remember.”

Conway’s heartrate soared and his head jerked as if looking to his attorney. “It may’ve been a back-hand.”

“Closed-fist back-hand?”

Conway waited, but no one rescued him. “Yes.”

Wonderful. Not only did he look like a liar, now the fact that he’d used a fist on his six-year-old daughter was now on record. “Just a few more questions, Mr. Conway. You had a dog once, correct?”

“Yeah.” The word was sullen.

“How long did you have this dog?”

“It died after about five years. Six, maybe.”

“And in those five or six years, did the dog misbehave?”

“It wasn’t perfect. Yeah.”

“Did you ever strike the dog with your fist?”

Conway was quiet for a moment, as if processing the question. “I might’ve shook it up a little once or twice.”

“Did you ever strike the dog with your _fist_?”

“No.”

“But your daughter…you thought it was appropriate to strike her with your fist.”

Silence.

“Answer the question, Mr. Conway.”

“She was disrespecting me.”

“But a dog can’t disrespect you, can it, Mr. Conway? Because a dog isn’t a human being.” Matt’s words now vibrated with anger. “But your daughter, _she’s_ a human being with all sorts of complicated thoughts and feelings in her head and her heart. Of course the only way to get through to her would be to hit her. Is that right, Mr. Conway?”

“Objection,” Hayes managed. “Compound question.”

“I’ll rephrase,” he said tightly. “You thought the only way to get through to your six-year-old daughter was to hit her. Is that right?”

“I wasn’t thinking,” Conway snapped.

“Oh, was it an emotional response, then?”

“Sure, yeah. I mean, she was makin’ me angry.”

He’d just lost any chance of trying to argue that the strike had actually been disciplinary. Matt switched to the final topic. “You’ve been convicted of sex crimes against children in the past, haven’t you,  Mr. Conway?”

“Objection,” Hayes cut in.

“You want a protective order, take it up with the judge, Hayes.”

“One of those counts was from his youth,” she insisted. “That evidence is inadmissible.”

“I’m not asking about evidence,” Matt shot back, “I’m asking about adjudication. How hard do you want to fight me on this?”

She maintained her perfect posture, but there was defeat in her voice as she instructed her witness to answer the question.

“Yes,” Conway said, finally devoid of bravado.

“You’ve been convicted of multiple counts of criminal sexual act in the third and second degree. Isn’t that correct?”

“Yes.”

“And one count of rape in the second degree?”

He physically wilted. “Yeah. Years ago.”

Matt zeroed in, asking specific questions about each instance, forcing Conway to elaborate, then doubling back to a previous question to make sure his answers hadn’t changed. Sometimes they did; sometimes they didn’t. Regardless, it created a grisly story, one now spelled out, point by point, for reference at trial. The hardest part was keeping control of his own mounting fury.

“I have one last question for you, Mr. Conway. Knowing your personal history of abuse, knowing Ella is currently staying at a place that is safe with people who care about her, why do you insist on battling for custody?”

Conway’s teeth ground together. “She’s my little girl.”

Matt knew the devil was all over his face. He didn’t care—he wanted Conway to feel the danger he was in. “You’re referring to the same little girl whom you’ve struck repeatedly, with more violence than you ever used on your own _dog_ , and whom you struck on at least one occasion simply because she, as a regular six-year-old, was slow getting ready for school _and you were angry_?”

“Objection—compound question!”

Matt slowly turned his head towards Hayes. “Yeah. It is. I won’t bother rephrasing. I’m done.”

 

Matt waited outside while Foggy discussed the issue of transcription with Hayes and the court reporter. Aside from asking for a braille copy, Matt didn’t have much to contribute. Instead, he leaned on his cane and breathed in slowly through his nose, trying to get Conway’s voice out of his head. It kept turning into Stick’s.

A much nicer voice finally broke through. “Thanks for letting me know, Graham. We’ll see what we can do. Yeah, we’ll swing by tomorrow. See you then.” Foggy pocketed his phone as he wandered over next to Matt on the sidewalk. “That was intense.”

“I keep telling you to stop wearing that blue tie when you visit Everett’s. Graham Burnham is falling for you hard and fast and it’s probably too late to stop it anymore.”

“First of all, you don’t even know what tie I’m wearing right now—”

“Green?” Matt guessed, just because he’d have a lot of fun with it if he happened to be right.

“Gray. Second, no, I was referring to your cross examination.”

“I guess intense is one word for it.” Matt clenched his fist around his cane. “Just think, if this goes to trial and Hayes puts him on the stand…”

“It’d be a bloodbath. Which is why she won’t. Take my arm; let’s go.”

“I can dream.” Matt took Foggy’s elbow as they started walking. “But what did Burnham want?”

Foggy sighed. “Apparently Ella’s having trouble. She’s acting out or something. Alice isn’t too worried; she thinks Ella is testing Everett’s to make sure they really care about her, no matter how difficult she is. But Burnham is worried that all this is because she found out about the adoption plans.”

Matt turned all his focus onto Foggy. “Adoption plans?”

“Apparently, a couple of families are expressing interest. Let’s cross.”

“ _Already_?” Matt knew he sounded like a protective freak. He just…adoption in New York wasn’t easy. Fairytales didn’t happen. “You think Ella’s ready for that?”

“The process is just getting started. She should have plenty of time to adjust. Ooh, taxi.”

Matt tugged on his arm, ignoring the cars whizzing by. “Hang on. Can we discuss this?”

Foggy stopped and Matt wished he had some kind of shield from his best friend’s scrutiny. “What’s to discuss? It’s not our decision.”

“I know, I just…” What did he expect to even do about this? “This is too soon. How did she even find out already?”

A shrug. “Apparently she was spying and heard something she wasn’t supposed to. Sound familiar?”

“Don’t you get it? Everett’s can’t even keep her from spying on them—this is _exactly_ what I’m talking about.”

“Uh, no, it’s not. I’m talking about a tenacious and adorable little girl discovering a harmless secret prematurely; _you’re_ talking about Everett’s letting her go home with serial killers or something.”

“Harmless,” Matt echoed. “It’s destabilizing.”

“Ella’s not you, Matt,” he countered exasperatedly.

He cocked his head. “What?”

“For her, she’s never known anything but abuse and neglect. She needs to find a good home sooner rather than later. I mean, for you, maybe getting adopted straight out of ending up at St. Agnes would’ve been destabilizing.” Foggy shrugged. “Your life wasn’t sunshine and rainbows before the orphanage, but correct me if I’m wrong—seriously, _please_ correct me—but I’m about sixty percent confident that you didn’t experience any actual abuse until Stick.”

Matt narrowed his eyes. “What did you just say?”

 

Foggy

It occurred to Foggy, very belatedly, that he’d never called Stick’s behavior abuse to Matt’s face. And this probably wasn’t the right time for it. “Never mind.”

“Foggy.”

“Do you _really_ want to have this conversation right now? _Here_?”

“It wasn’t that bad.” A bit of the devil was leaking across his face, through his voice, into the way his grip tightened on his cane.

Oh, so he did want an argument. Well, Foggy had long since prepared his side. “What part wasn’t so bad? The part where he broke your arm? Or made you throw up? Knocked you unconscious? And was it the first or second or _fifteenth_ time any of those things happened?”

“Did Karen tell you about the nervous system technique?”

That was _so_ beside the point. “If a client walked in and told us his ten-year-old son went through what you went through, what charges would we be looking at?”

Matt’s lip curled in disgust. “Please.”

“What charges, Matt?”

“I don’t know. Maybe assault.”

Foggy wanted to scream, but he took a moment to process that. Assault required reasonable apprehension of imminent harmful or offensive contact. Which meant…Matt was admitting to something. “You were scared?”

“I was ten,” he snapped.

Maybe not such an admission, then. “What about battery, Matt?”

“It was training. I consented.”

“You were ten! Any consent you could’ve given was automatically ineffective!”

He shrugged, like the particularities of the law couldn’t possibly apply to him and his special superhero circumstances.

“Assault,” Foggy listed. “Battery. Are we forgetting something? Oh, yeah! The child abuse!”

“I wasn’t in any imminent danger.”

“Did he hurt you?”

“What do you think happens when people take a contact sport?” Matt snapped. “Sometimes they get hurt. Not that you’d know.”

That was childish, but Foggy was better than that. This was not the time to bring up his flag football experience that resulted in two broken fingers. “I’ll admit it; you know the facts better than I do. So just tell me the truth for once. If a client walked in here and said their kid went through what you went through, _all_ of it, what would you call it?”

Matt might as well have been sliced out of solid rock. Every part of his body looked taught, strung to the breaking point.

Foggy shouldn’t push. He couldn’t not push. “Well?”

“I already said it and you don’t care. It wasn’t that bad. In fact, it was good for me!” He flung those words with all the stubbornness Matt used when doing something he knew was stupid.

Well, Foggy was learning his lesson. Namely, that he’d never be able to cross-examine Matt into confessing that his time with Stick constituted actual child abuse. It was hard to let go of that tool in his toolbox, to realize that all the logic in the world just wouldn’t cut it here. Especially when Foggy knew better than anyone (except maybe some very foolish prosecutors) that Matt Murdock’s logical abilities were exceptional.

So he just asked, “Taxi?”

Matt gave him some sort of look Foggy couldn’t quite interpret, but nodded.

No problem. Foggy was creative. More than that, he was a good friend. He’d figure something else out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So some of the flare Matt uses in the deposition should probably be saved for trial, so Conway and his attorney don't have the chance to practice with it. Then again, part of the point of all the pre-trial stuff is like grandstanding towards the other side. Show off, impress them with the strength of your case, and you're more likely to get a better settlement. So that's arguably what Matt's doing here. Tbh, though, I just wanted more drama.
> 
> Oh, and the deposition would totes go longer. Way longer. But probably no one wants to read that.


	4. You Can See the Smoke from a Mile Away

Matt

His impulse—and he could admit it if only to himself—was always to avoid Foggy after an argument. Of the two of them, Foggy was the only one with any right to reject a reconciliation attempt. Therefore, Foggy should be the one to bridge the gap.

But Matt couldn’t keep putting that responsibility on him. A voice in the back of his head that sounded more like his own than Stick’s agreed…because one day, Foggy would get sick of it and just leave. Another voice, one that sounded like Foggy and Karen and Maggie all at once, was growing louder every day as it told the first to shut up. It wasn’t about earning Foggy’s commitment. It was about Matt being a good friend to him.

And maybe it was stupid, but he kept thinking about the pancakes Foggy had made when Matt stumbled home bleeding from Stone’s sword. Those pancakes had basically saved his life.

When was the last time he’d offered Foggy anything like that?

It seemed uncreative to offer food, and besides, finding food that Foggy enjoyed didn’t exactly involve a high degree of difficulty. Baseball, though. Foggy was an avid fan. Besides that, Matt had little appreciation for the sport, so getting Foggy tickets to a game couldn’t be construed as self-seeking behavior. It would be a clear and obvious gift.

 

Karen

She couldn’t put off learning stances forever. When she and Matt met at the gym that night, he barely gave her the chance to orient herself before launching into the importance of the proper stance for maximizing both stability and agility. Once he thought she was close to getting it, he let her throw a few punches and even try some kicks, but he wasn’t focusing on the quality of the strikes.

“Keep your knee bent. Like this.” She expected him to demonstrate by modeling the stance himself, as he’d done throughout the rest of the night. Instead, he crouched, put one hand on her calf and the other on her thigh, and bent her leg into position.

Both his hands on her leg did terrible, terrible things to her concentration.

“Got it?” He straightened back up. “Just hold that.”

“It’s just hard to balance when I’m kicking.”

“No, no, you’ve got it. And if we practice enough, it’ll become muscle memory. You up for something a little more challenging?”

“Definitely,” she said, which was how she ended up shuffling back and forth across the ring, alternating between pursuing Matt and retreating from him. Again, he let her throw a few strikes, but he had absolutely zero reaction when she hit him, even when she tried using a bit more force. Any time she got sloppy with her footing, however, she instantly had his attention.

“So,” he said, quickening his pace as he danced towards her. “How was your day?”

She almost tripped. “You expect me to make conversation right now?”

“You’re overthinking. Trust your body. Easier if you’re focusing on talking. So. How was your day?”

“Started out pretty great. I gambled and invested like three hours at the nursing home, but I think it paid off.”

“Nursing home?” He effortlessly avoided a punch she threw. “We’re not doing anything with nursing homes.”

“It’s for my own case.” Sometimes Matt and Foggy still forgot she was her own boss when it came to her PI cases. “I talked to this really nice gentleman who confirmed most of the facts I needed _and_ offered to set me up with his nephew.”

“Should I be offended? Watch your footing—you’re too lined up.”

She made her stance a little wider. “You don’t have to worry.” Karen felt the ropes against her back; at the same moment, Matt started retreating, leaving her to pursue. “So, how was your day? How’s Ella?”

“That depends on who you ask, I guess. Apparently there are some people considering adopting her.”

“Already? That’s incredible.” Then she got a better look at his face. “You disagree.”

“She’s acting out,” he said, dodging the question as easily as he dodged her kick. “Self-sabotaging, resisting change.” Now he advanced, forcing her to back up while he quickened the pace even more.

“Maybe you should talk to her,” Karen said, panting slightly. “Tell her she can trust the people at Everett’s to find her a good home. So she doesn’t have to worry.”

Matt’s head snapped up. “You’ve been talking to Foggy.”

“Sorry, I didn’t realize all my good ideas needed Foggy’s approval.” She reached the end of the ring and they switched directions.

“That’s not…” he sighed. “You know that’s not what I meant.”

“I haven’t been talking to Foggy. I’ve actually been working on other stuff.” Her own cases, yes, but also the news of her dad’s sickness, news she hadn’t been ready to talk about even with Matt.

“Other stuff?”

“Don’t change the subject. Maybe I haven’t met her yet, but I think this little girl is really confused right now, and she’s hurting more than she’s ever let on to either of you.” They’d reached the other end of the ring again. Matt was right: her footwork was impeccable with all her mental energy focused on getting through to her obtuse boyfriend. “Just help her relax.  And she needs to be working _with_ Everett’s and whoever they find for her, not against them.”

Matt’s jaw ticked.

“What?”

“I can’t tell her that.”

“Why _not_?”

“I just…I just can’t.”

She made the unilateral decision to put training on the back burner for now. Stopping in the middle of the ring, she grabbed the front of his shirt to slow him down. “Don’t give me that; you’re smart. Tell me why.”

“I don’t want to lie to her?” It came out like a question.

Matt Murdock, averse to telling a lie? That was a first. She tried not to feel bitter that he was suddenly so concerned about dishonesty towards a six-year-old. “You can’t just _assume_ it would be a lie.”

“I can’t assume anything. I won’t risk telling her to trust only to find out that she shouldn’t have. Could you risk that, Karen?” His mouth twisted into something that was probably supposed to be a smile. “Look, maybe between Foggy’s unshakable optimism and my realism, it’ll all balance out.”

She hesitated. “Listen, Matt…your mentor—”

“This isn’t about me, Karen. Or Stick. What do I have to do to convince you that he was on my side?”

“But he—”

He flung his arms out. “Look at this place, Karen! You think I could be here, doing this with you, if he hadn’t taught me how to control my senses? Look what I can do!” He flipped, just jumped up and flipped like it was no big deal, landing lightly on the balls of his feet. “He taught me that. Cancel the nightlife sometime, Karen, and let me take you parkouring. _Please_ , just let me show you how incredible it is.” He moved closer, eyes bright and skin flushed. Trailing one hand along her jaw, he tilted her head, then ducked down and kissed her deeply. When he pulled back, his eyes smoldered. “I can feel your pulse in your lips and I’ll taste you on my tongue for the next hour. I owe all that to him.”

“Don’t do that. Don’t say that.”

He touched his forehead to hers. “It’s the truth.”

“I don’t care!” She pushed him back. “You can’t have it both ways, Matt. You can’t insist that your experience with Stick wasn’t bad and at the same time use it to justify worrying about Ella, because I don’t believe for one second that all your worry about who might adopt her is limited to someone worse than Stick.”

Matt’s visage darkened…but he didn’t argue.

Karen took that as a small victory. “Okay. You know what? Maybe we should talk about something else.”

“Or we could just get back to training.”

“Yeah. No, wait.” Honesty was a two-way street, and for all that she didn’t think he was thinking very clearly right now, he was at least trying to be honest. “I need to tell you something. I’m fine, but…”

His head tilted. Then he reached for her hands where she was twisting her fingers into the hem of her shirt. “What’s wrong?”

She gave herself a second just to enjoy the strength of his hand holding hers before admitting, “It’s my dad. He’s sick. He, um, asked me to go to Vermont for a bit. You know, and help him.”

“Help him how?”

She shrugged. “I don’t even know, Matt. He wasn’t making a lot of sense on the phone.” She paused. “It’s the first time he’s called me first in three years.”

Matt pressed his lips into a grim line. He knew about her dad. Kind of. He knew the relationship was shaky, and he knew how badly Karen wished it weren’t and how scared she was of letting herself believe anything would ever change. “Are you going?” he asked.

“Not yet.”

“Karen…”

The disapproval was heavy in his voice. “I’m not asking your permission, Matt, and I haven’t made up my mind yet anyway. I’m just warning you that there’s a possibility we’ll have to have our next few dates over Skype.”

His eyes remained narrowed for a second, but then he deliberately cocked his head with something of a smile. “Oh, was this a date?”

Thankful he was choosing not to push, she slapped his arm. “I never even know with you.”

He made a show of rubbing the spot. “Ow. Because I usually prefer my dates to be a bit less violent.”

“Well, _I_ usually prefer my dates to smell better.”

His eyes literally widened. “Are you referring to me or the gym?”

She walked right up in front of him and brushed her nose against his. “What do you think?”

“Oh.” Angling his head, he rubbed his nose against her cheek. “Well, shouldn’t be hard to guess. Lots of…” His nuzzling turned into kissing. “Circumstantial evidence.”

She relaxed into his arms. They could argue about Stick later. She could deal with her dad later. For now, in this old gym, she was content just to hold him.

 

Foggy

Two tickets.

For a moment, Foggy just stared uncomprehendingly at them. Matt had scrawled his name on the envelope surely not because he wanted thanks for its own sake. No, Matt was…“communicating.”

Knowing Matt, it was a clear and obvious apology. He probably thought he was being difficult over the Ella case. Which…yes, he was. But Foggy had expected that and besides, from a utilitarian perspective, Matt’s contributions completely overshadowed any obstacles he presented.

Foggy rubbed his eyelids. The problem with this case was that it was about Matt almost as much as it was about Ella, but Matt couldn’t see that. Which meant his interpretation of the situation was inevitably skewed, and would remain so until he could sort through his own experiences—what they meant, where they should and shouldn’t apply. Until that happened, he and Foggy were going to keep opposing each other.

Still, the apology told Foggy that at least Matt was trying. It was just up to Foggy to give Matt the right tools to figure the rest out. Fortunately, Foggy had an idea.

He just didn’t want to think too long about it.

 

Mr. Burnham met them in the lobby of Everett’s. “Mr. Murdock, Mr. Nelson! Great to see you again.”

It…it sounded like _maybe_ his voice was a bit warmer when he said Foggy’s name. Foggy could see Matt smirking but had no idea if it was because he was actually picking up on something from Burnham, or if he could just sense how flustered Foggy felt.

Jerk.

Foggy should probably get a wedding ring. Also…get married. “We’re here to see Ella,” he said, maybe just a bit more pointedly than was warranted.

“Right, right. You know where to find her?”

“We’ll manage,” Matt said, letting Foggy guide him down a hallway. He leaned closer to Foggy. “You know, Burnham’s a great guy. Good with kids.”

“You’re hilarious. He looks like my uncle.”

They met Ella in the common room, as always. Everett’s had just received a donation including more finger paint, so it seemed their activities for the day were already planned. Foggy and Matt sat awkwardly in the undersized chairs around the table and Foggy and Ella proceeded to make as much fun of Matt’s painting as possible, preferably through conflicting criticisms.

“The blue in the sky is wrong,” Ella said at one point.

“How can blue be _wrong_?” Matt demanded.

“It’s too blue.”

Brilliant argument. It defeated Matt, at least, because he reached dourly for the green to mix the color into something a little more aqua.

“Dude,” Foggy said. “Too much green. Your sky looks like it’s out of some alien sci-fi novel.”

Matt glared at him and flipped the paper over. “Abracadabra, now it’s the ocean.”

That was actually kind of resourceful.

Anyway, time to transition to the real business. “How long have you been painting, Ella?”

Matt tilted his head a little, and Foggy remembered too late how familiar Matt was with his examining-a-witness voice.

“Long as I can remember,” she said simply, concentrating on her work. “Whenever Mommy remembered to buy stuff for me.”

“Did your dad ever paint with you?”

Matt’s shoulders regained some of the tension they’d lost as soon as he sat down with Ella, but he didn’t object. He clearly knew Foggy was up to something, but he also had faith.

“Maybe once,” Ella said, swirling her finger anew through a puddle of purple paint.

“How often did you hang out with your dad?”

“Mommy left me with him a lot.”

That was an interesting way to put it. “Is that when he’d hit you? In front of her?”

Ella stopped painting and folded her hands in her lap, mindless of the purple smudges left on her pants. She nodded.

Foggy was a terrible person. But before, when Ella and Matt had been comparing bruises, Foggy could see it. You just had to tie Matt’s history to someone else’s. He took a deep breath. “Didn’t he say you deserved it?”

Matt’s head jerked around.

Confusion filled her face. Why was Foggy bringing this up _now_? Was she in trouble? They were just finger-painting.

Foggy shrugged defensively. “Ella, didn’t he say it was for your own good?”

Her huge eyes searched his. “Yes…” she said uncertainly.

“Do you think he made you stronger?”

“ _Foggy_ ,” Matt snarled.

Ella’s whole body grew rigid, scared eyes on Matt.

Foggy tried to backtrack, guilt tangling through his intestines. “Sorry, Ella, forget I—”

Matt flashed him the finger—behind his back, sure, but still technically _in front of a child_ —and Foggy shut up while Matt crouched in front of Ella, one hand on her upper arm. Whether to comfort her or keep her from shrinking away, Foggy wasn’t sure. “Hey. Foggy shouldn’t have said that, but he wasn’t talking about you. He’s just working through some stuff.”

That was rich.

“What your dad did wasn’t okay, and Foggy and I both know that. Remember what I told you about the sad colors?”

“People who give them are bad.” She was clearly fighting to keep her voice steady. “He didn’t give them to me to make me stronger, though. He just said I deserved it.”

“You didn’t. He was lying.”

“Why was he lying?”

“Because he was scared of how bad he was and he was trying to make himself feel better. It was a horrible, selfish thing to do. Speaking of…” His voice sharpened a bit and he stood up. “I need to talk to Foggy for a second, okay? We’ll be right back.”

Great.

Matt set such a rapid pace on the way out that anyone looking closely would’ve been able to tell immediately that Foggy wasn’t leading anyone anywhere. The second they were outside, he dropped Foggy’s arm and just kept going.

“I’ve seen you do a lot of stupid things and I’ve seen you be really selfish, but that back there…” Matt gave his head a short, sharp shake. “That was unreal.”

Foggy hurried to catch up. “I know, I’m sorry, I took it too far. I just wanted you to see what you sound like.”

Matt whipped around and spun his cane between them once, like a weapon. “Selfish.”

“Are you gonna hit me?”

“Honestly?” His voice was a knife. “I’d really like to.”

Foggy resisted the impulse to put his hands up at the sight of the rapid rise and fall of Matt’s broad shoulders. If Matt needed to hit him…well, he wasn’t going to pretend he didn’t deserve it.

Matt let out a harsh breath, turned on his heel, and stalked down the sidewalk again.

“What if she’d said yes?” Foggy shouted after him before he could think better of it. “Yes, she thought her dad made her stronger? A _warrior_ or something twisted like that? What if she actually believed that?”

He stopped dead.

Foggy drew closer but maintained a safe distance. “You heard what Conway said! It was bad enough that he hit her at all, but you made a point of getting him to admit that it was with a fist. Why does that matter, Matt? What did Stick use?”

Matt didn’t flinch, not quite, but it was a near thing.

“I know you keep insisting this isn’t about you. But you’re a _lawyer_ , Matt. You know how to compare facts. If you keep shying away from defining what exactly happened to you, eventually that’ll bleed over onto Ella.” Foggy hesitated a moment. If only Matt would turn around so he could see his face. “No one who gives sad colors is good. Or is that only true in her case?”

No answer. Didn’t even look like he was breathing. His head lowered.

“What, because she’s a girl or something? Because that’s grossly sexist of you.”

“…It’s not that,” he said heavily.

“Then what? Because she’s not _you_? In which case you may not be sexist, but you’re definitely guilty of extreme narcissism.”

“Yeah, well.” Matt turned around slowly, free hand in his pocket. “That’s nothing new.” He kept his face angled towards the sidewalk, so Foggy couldn’t tell for sure, but he didn’t look like he was about to throw any punches.

“Look,” Foggy said quietly. “I’m really sorry. I was out of line back there. I just…I want you to be honest. For Ella’s sake if not your own, because I’m starting to seriously question your knowledge of, you know, _the law_. You know, the thing we’re trying to use to _protect_ her.”

Matt gave a sad shake of his head that Foggy couldn’t interpret.

“Just tell me the truth. Think about her, and what her dad did to her, and how hard we’ve fought to protect her from anything like that ever happening again. Now tell me. If she’d walked into our office with _your_ backstory, what would we call it?”

He licked his lips uneasily. “Assault.”

Raising his eyebrows, Foggy waited.

“Um. Battery.”

And?

If he clenched his jaw any harder, it would break.

Foggy wanted to reach for him, wrap him up in a hug, but they were in public. Matt would probably parkour up a tree. Or maybe Foggy was really just scared that the slightest touch would break him right now. “Matty?” he whispered.

“It was…it was child abuse. I get it.”

Foggy closed his eyes. He wanted to celebrate this apparent breakthrough, but he had to be sure. “I can’t hear your heartbeat. Do you really mean that?”

Something brushed his fingers; Foggy opened his eyes to see Matt taking his hand and placing it firmly against his own chest. “I get it, Foggy.”

 _Thump-thump_.

With a sniff, Matt dropped Foggy’s hand. “Just…don’t ever do that again.”

“I won’t,” Foggy agreed hastily. “Promise. That was…I just care about you, you know? A lot.”

“Feeling’s mutual.” Matt cleared his throat. “You should go make sure Ella’s okay.”

“You don’t think she’d rather see you right now?” Seemed more like he’d ruined all her faith in him in one fell swoop.

Matt half-smirked. “You broke it, you fix it.”

“Where are you going?”

“Fogwell’s. Need to, um, punch something.”

Which was code for needing to do some serious thinking. Foggy tried to keep his relief stuffed deep down somewhere Matt couldn’t sense it. Maybe he’d finally gotten through to him after all.

 

The next morning, Foggy showed up way too early. “I think daylight savings time is a ruse,” he declared to the office at large.

Karen was briskly making coffee while Matt sat on the edge of the counter, obviously tracking her every movement. “Daylight savings happened weeks ago.”

“Also,” Matt chimed in, “it’s not daylight savings time’s fault you stayed up all night suffering through Marci’s favorite horror movies.”

Foggy scowled at him. “How can you possibly know that?”

Matt shrugged. “I know you.”

“What color is my tie?” Foggy demanded, just to be safe.

Karen whispered something in Matt’s ear and he made a face. “Isn’t Dijon a kind of mustard?”

“It’s also a color,” she said breezily.

“Well, I’ll take your word for it.”

Foggy felt a little flare of vicarious happiness just by virtue of seeing his two best friends so adorably domestic. That, and the fact that Matt was still, you know, speaking to him. But the happiness fizzled out when his phone started ringing. “Too early,” he groaned.

“Be professional,” Karen hissed.

Foggy held the phone to his ear. “Franklin Nelson.” Matt snorted loudly when Burnham’s voice greeted him, but his face drained of color when he heard the words coming over the speaker.

“Mr. Nelson.” Burnham’s voice was tight and carefully controlled. “It’s been six hours. We called the police and they’re looking for her now.”

It felt like Matt and Karen were suddenly very far away. “Her?” Foggy repeated weakly. “Ella?”

“She’s missing.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter's a bit longer than usual. Also, this whole story is now 11 chapters. Whoops.
> 
> Also, is the green sky a reference to the Sunshineverse? You bet it is.


	5. You Don't Even Have to Speak

Ella

She was so scared she couldn’t think. She’d been outside with the other kids, and this man and woman walked by with a dog. It was bigger than she was, gray and white and fluffy, and she hadn’t even though to ask Miss Alice for permission when she climbed over the fence to ask if she could pet it.

That was against the new rules. Miss Alice said she wasn’t supposed to talk to strangers. But Mommy never really cared, so it was an easy rule to forget.

The dog was really nice and so happy to see her, and the couple seemed really nice too. They asked if she wanted to give the dog a treat and said they had a bag of dog treats in the car just around the corner. She hadn’t even thought about the rules that said not to go anywhere with strangers, not to leave Everett’s.  And the dog really liked the treats. She was just wiping the dog’s sticky slobber on her pants when the man plucked her up and threw her into the car. She screamed and screamed and tried to kick, but he was too strong. He pushed a bad-smelling rag into her mouth.

And that was the last thing she remembered.

 

She woke up in a basement with a bright light in her eyes. She felt sore everywhere, and her fingers tingled because the rope wrapped around her was biting into her skin.

“Morning, beautiful.” It was a new man bending over her. “Can you smile for me, baby?”

She screamed. He smothered her mouth with his hand and she bit down as hard as she could.

He spewed a bunch of angry words she’d only ever heard from her dad and backed up, shaking his hand. “Get the camera ready. Let’s just get this over with.”

Three other men started moving around. The woman was nowhere to be seen. A different man came and stood right beside her, so close she could smell his sweat. He chewed gum loudly in her ears. With one hand, reached out to play with her hair. She tried to jerk away, but the ropes kept her still and he just yanked her head closer. “Stop squirming, baby.”

His breath was hot and horrible. She screwed up her face and braced for his anger.

Then the lights shut off.

Barely made a difference to Ella—she couldn’t get any more scared. But people started screaming. Two flashlights lit up a new person in the room, someone dressed all in black who moved like a wolf: vicious, moving from person to person and…she couldn’t tell exactly what he was doing. But it hurt everyone else.

The man holding her hair dropped her and pulled out a gun. There was a _bang_ followed by more _bangs_ and her ears rang, but all the people holding flashlights had dropped them. She couldn’t see what was happening. But the _bangs_ stopped and everything got quiet.

One of the flashlights rolled on the ground until she could see the new man. He was standing in the middle of the room, shoulders heaving. When he turned towards her, her stomach dropped.

The scary man had seen her. He was walking towards her, stepping out of the light of the flashlight. She couldn’t see him, could just hear his footsteps approaching. Ella tried to shrink away, but she couldn’t move.

But the scary man stopped before he reached her. Then his footsteps moved back and to the side. He picked up a flashlight and shined it not at her but at himself.

Ella swallowed. There were dark red smears on his skin under the faceless black.

He moved forward again, but he didn’t try to hit her or anything. He set the flashlight on the ground next to him, so its light spread over both of them, and then then he knelt in front of her and pushed the mask back so she could see his eyes.

It was _Matt_.

She tried to say his name, but the word came out muffled from the duct tape.

“Shh.” He moved his hands to the tape.

But she’d just seen him use those hands to hurt people, the people who’d used their hands to hurt her, and suddenly all the hands made her think of her dad. She strained to get away and the rope keeping her from getting away made her panic.

Matt pulled back immediately. “Ella, it’s me.”

That wasn’t what she was worried about. She let out a whimper. _Please don’t hurt me, I didn’t do anything wrong._

Matt licked his lips, then pulled the mask all the way off and sat down in front of her, crisscross-apple-sauce. He still towered over her. “It’s me. And I won’t hurt you.”

She nodded, trying to believe him, trying to focus on his promise and not his fists that were wet with blood.

But there was so much blood. It wasn’t his—he’d taken it from other people and he could take it from her, too, easy as breathing, and suddenly breathing was impossible and her hands were tingling worse than before. Matt began saying something, but she couldn’t really hear him over her racing heart and he seemed pretty far-away anyway.

She didn’t even realize he’d laid a hand on her chest until she felt warmth spreading over her heart. He used the slightest bit of pressure, just enough that she had to try a little harder to breathe, which was terrifying for a second before she started taking deeper breaths, making his hand rise and fall. All of a sudden, she could hear him again, and he wasn’t so far away after all.

“That’s it, shhhh. Focus on me.”

She tried. But the hand on her chest was gloved and bloody and she tried not to look at it, but tears were building in her eyes. She made a muffled sound that wasn’t even supposed to be words.

But Matt finally got it. He stopped touching her and took off the gloves, then reached around her to brush his bare fingers against her hands tied behind her back. “See? It’s just me.”

She was so stupid. She _knew_ that. She nodded, trying to apologize past the tape over her mouth.

He moved hands slowly up her arm, up to her chin, up to her face. He kept contact the whole way, so she wasn’t startled when his fingers brushed the tape. “Let me take care of you.” He was so careful when he pulled the duct tape off her mouth. It still hurt—really bad—but he looked like maybe it hurt him too, even though it seemed like none of the bad guys had touched him and definitely no one had put duct tape anywhere on him.

“Matt,” she gasped finally.

“Hi.” He ran his fingers through her hair for a second, and she felt him pressing on different parts of her head the way Miss Alice did when she fell off the merry-go-round that one time. “Can you hold still for me for a second?”

The ropes were still cutting into her so she couldn’t _not_ hold still, but he must know that.

Sure enough, his hands reached for the ropes around her body. Only then did she remember that he couldn’t see anything. Which didn’t make sense, because he sure _looked_ like he could see out there, but she didn’t think he’d been lying all this time either. “Should we get Foggy or Miss Alice?” she asked, and was proud to hear that her voice didn’t shake.

“Why?” he asked quietly, still tracing the ropes as they circled around and around her.

“I can’t untie stuff without looking.”

“Ha.” He seemed to find whatever he was looking for because he started tugging at part of the rope at her back. “Good thinking, but I can do it. I found a broken part.”

The rope hadn’t _seemed_ broken. It’d seemed unbreakable, actually. But she felt the tightness loosening around her.

“Are you magic?” she asked.

“No.”

“I think you are,” she said firmly. “That’s how you found me and that’s how you saved me from all those people and that’s how—that’s how—how—” The ropes fell away and she tried to breathe in deeply. But she couldn’t. Again.

Alarm flickered across his face. “Shhh. Ella, c’mere.”

His arms wrapped around her and he was so big and so strong, but he smelled like blood and now that he was holding her, she could _feel_ all the anger still trapped inside him.

“Matt—” She wanted to tell him not to be angry but she also wanted to tell him she was scared and she also couldn’t breathe.

“You’re safe. I’m here.” His voice rumbled through her entire body. “I have you.”

She didn’t want to cry here. It wasn’t a safe place to cry. Dad would be so angry. She sniffled hard and tried to wriggle out of his grasp, because him holding her would definitely make her cry. But he wouldn’t let her go and he didn’t complain when her tears made his shirt wet.

He held her for a long time, long enough for her to stop crying and feel sleepy instead. It was comfortable here, with her head on his shoulder, focusing on the way he was rubbing her back. But…

“We have to go,” he whispered.

She burrowed deeper into him. “Where?”

“You have a choice, Ella. I can take you to the police department and we can ask for Detective Mahoney. He’ll make sure you get back to Everett’s and he’ll keep you safe.”

But that sounded like… “I wanna stay with you.”

He smiled a little; she felt it, the way his face moved where it was tucked against the top of her head. “I’ll stay with you no matter what you choose. The other option is that I take you straight back to Everett’s so you can sleep in your own bed or talk to someone there if you want.”

“I wanna go home.”

“What do you mean?” His voice took on that careful voice that grownups sometimes used.

“I wanna go _home_.”

“With your mom?” She nodded. “That’s not an option,” he said sadly. “I’ll come with you to the police or I’ll come with you to Everett’s. Which sounds better?”

“I don’t wanna talk to anyone.”

He smoothed down part of her hair. “That’s okay. We can go to Everett’s and sneak in. You won’t have to talk to anyone until you wake up tomorrow.”

“Sneak in?” That could be fun. She pulled back to make sure he was serious.

His smile still didn’t quite reach his eyes. Or maybe it did, but there was just also worry in his eyes too, which made the happiness less happy. Still, he leaned closer. “How sneaky can you be?”

 

At first, she kept her eyes shut as hard as she could. They were just so _high_ and Matt was moving so _fast_. But he didn’t drop her and he never tripped. Eventually, she opened her eyes to see the world flying past, all the colors blurring together, high above the streetlights streaking through the black night. She held on tighter and tried not to get dizzy because she didn’t want to have to close her eyes again.

Everything was so beautiful.

Finally, they landed on the roof of Everett’s. The _roof_.

“Okay.” Matt shifted her weight a little. “Here’s the hard part. We need to sneak in really quietly.”

“Like ninjas!”

“Shh.” He tightened his grip a little. “Exactly.”

He lowered them to the window right outside her bedroom, and she was about to tell him it was locked and they couldn’t get in, but somehow he opened it. He was gonna have a real hard time convincing her he wasn’t magic now. Silently, he eased them both inside, but he didn’t let her go. He carried her all the way to her bed and set her lightly on the blankets, so lightly the mattress didn’t even squeak like always.

But she looked at her hands. “I’m all dirty. I’m supposed to get cleaned up before bed. It’s the rule.” And she'd already broken so many today.

He seemed to think about that. “I’ll give you two more choices. First, you can forget about the rules just this once. Second, you can wait here while I go to the bathroom to get stuff to clean your hands.”

“Can I come with you?”

“Do you want anyone else to wake up?”

Not if she’d have to talk to them. She shook her head.

“I hate to be the one to tell you this, Ella, but you’re not exactly a quiet person. So, your choice.”

She bit her lip and felt guilty for even thinking it, but: “Let’s break the rule.”

“Good choice. Get in under the blankets for me, yeah?”

She obeyed, wriggling in under the heavier blanket on top and twisting her fingers together, trying to get them to stop shaking.

Somehow, he _knew_. Kneeling down beside the bed, he fished his hand under the blanket until he was holding both of hers in his.

“You’re not gonna leave?”

He shook his head.

“You’ll be here when I wake up?”

He let out a long, quiet sigh and she was afraid he’d say no. But… “Yeah, Ella. I’ll be here.”

 

Matt

This wasn’t going to be easy to get out of.

He could sense the sun rising outside, the city waking up. Some of the kids were already awake too, in other rooms. Adults were walking around, checking in on their wards. A very small part of him itched to take off now, to trust that someone else would be there when Ella woke up. But he couldn’t be certain. Besides, he’d promised _he_ would be there.

So he tried to keep his leg from jiggling as he sat in the ridiculously undersized chair he’d placed by her bed after she’d finally fallen asleep. The Devil of Hell’s Kitchen, crouching in a child’s chair beside a sleeping six-year-old. He hadn’t even had the chance to wash the blood off his face.

It was probably cute or something. Foggy would be furious to have missed it. Foggy would also have taken pictures, and if any of those got leaked, his reputation would be shot. He rubbed at the mask, where dried sweat itched beneath it. He wanted a shower and he wanted to sleep for about ten hours and he wanted to never have to sit in this stupid chair again.

Ella squirmed a little in her sleep, but it sounded peaceful. The nightmares had stopped at around four-thirty this morning. His gloves in his back pocket were filthy, but so were his hands. Still, he touched her hair. Just for a moment, he dropped his guard, let all his attention focus on the bushy strands beneath his fingers, on her warm breath, on her still-beating heart.

Worth it. It was all worth it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HAPPY THANKSGIVING, all you lovely readers!


	6. My House is Burning Down

Foggy

As part of his ongoing efforts not to upset Matt by worrying about Matt, Foggy was…trying not to worry. Matt tended to respond to worry in one of two ways: like a kicked puppy full of guilt, or like a cat when you tried to give it a bath. He refused to see it for what it actually was: evidence that people cared about him enough to prefer having him around, ideally uninjured.

Sure, Foggy had told him all that stuff about how Matt’s pain also hurt the people who cared about him, precisely _because_ they cared about him. And every once in a while, Matt did seem to remember that conversation. But Foggy knew better than to expect one conversation—which occurred while Matt was weak from blood loss, for that matter—to undo years of destructive thoughts and habits.

So Foggy was being patient and he was trying to worry…less. That way, when he did worry, it would mean something more. That was the goal, anyway.

Of course, Foggy was at perfect liberty to worry like crazy about Ella, which he did vigorously. All night. And all the next morning when he got to the office first and then had to wait around for Matt to show up so Matt could tell him everything was fine, that he’d found Ella and she was okay. Even though no one could stop Foggy from worrying about Ella, he also trusted Matt.

Rescuing people like her was kinda his thing, and Foggy had never been so thankful for it.

His phone rang while he was hunting through the cabinets for something sugary. “Hello?”

Burnham started speaking so quickly that if Foggy didn’t already basically know what had happened, he wouldn’t have been able to follow it. Ella was back, safe and sound, and saying something about a man in black who’d rescued her. But she was also upset and asking for Matt and Foggy to come visit as soon as possible.

“Matt’s not in yet,” Foggy said, “but I’ll be right there.” He hung up, sent Matt a text to meet him, and booked it to Everett’s.

Burnham ushered Foggy into the room Ella shared with a couple other girls. Miss Alice was also there, entertaining two little girls and presumably providing extra adult supervision, while Ella sat hunched on her bed, blinking round, black eyes.

“Hey.” Foggy sat on the bed beside her. “It’s really, _really_ good to—”

“Where’s Matt?” she burst out.

“He’s coming,” he said gently.

She bit down on her lip.

“Don’t believe me?” Foggy asked. She started twisting the blankets together in her hands. A horrible thought struck him. She looked fine, and Matt probably would’ve taken her to the hospital if she really weren’t okay, but he had to know for himself. “Ella, is something wrong? Did something happen?”

She looked at Alice. “I can’t tell you. He said not to tell.”

A chill raced through him. “Who did?”

She looked at him like he was stupid. “That’s a secret.”

“Ella, listen to me.” He put his hand over hers and squeezed. “When someone tells you to keep a secret, it’s usually not for good reasons. You don’t have to tell me, okay? But you have to tell someone you trust. Like Miss Alice or Mr. Burnham.”

She shook her head. “He said I couldn’t tell anyone. I think that’s why he wears the mask—to keep the secret.”

 _Oh_. Foggy couldn’t help his relieved smile because…that secret could’ve been so much worse. “Ella, pumpkin, I think might already know the secret.” He lowered his voice. “Is it about Matt?”

“I’m not supposed to tell anyone!” she screeched defiantly.

He put his hands over his ears. “Ow.” Also, now everyone else in the room was staring at them. Wonderful. “Ella,” he hissed. “Tell everyone you’re okay before they kick me out of here.”

She folded her arms across her chest.

Stubborn little imp.

“Mr. Nelson?” Alice strode across the room. “Is there a problem here?”

“Nope, no problem. Just Ella.”

Alice turned her piercing gaze to Ella. “Why were you screeching?”

“He says he already knows the secret,” she whispered.

Alice’s eyebrows shot up on her forehead and Foggy wished he could face-palm. “It’s okay, Alice. We just…” Do not lie in front of the small child. Do not teach the small child to lie.

“I’m not supposed to talk about my _rescuer_ ,” Ella explained fiercely. “He’s a secret.”

But Alice glanced at Foggy and mouthed, “Daredevil?” When Foggy nodded, she seemed to relax. “Oh. Well, no one’s forcing you to talk about him. _Are they_ , Mr. Nelson?”

He shook his head. “Absolutely not.”

“Indoor voices, Ella.” With that, Alice walked back to another group of children.

Foggy resisted the urge to glare at Ella; that urge died the second her huge, chocolate eyes met up with his.

“Where’s Matt?”

He tugged on one of her curls. “He’s probably just sleeping.”

Her eyes narrowed. “He promised he’d be here when I woke up, but he wasn’t, and I waited, and he still hasn’t come back.”

“Doesn’t mean he’s not sleeping, pumpkin. Finding you and bringing you back probably took a lot of—”

“Can you tell him to come see me?”

“I’ll do you one better. I’ll call him, and you can tell him yourself. Sound good?”

She nodded, looking instantly relieved.

Foggy dialed his number and felt like an idiot when he got Matt’s voice message. “Oh, sorry, Ella. He’s not, uh, great with phones.”

Ella’s relief had disappeared, though she wasn’t panicking quite yet.

“He has two.” Foggy was kind of babbling now, because he really hadn’t thought this through. Matt was horrible with phones and while he was more likely to pick up the burner, it was far from guaranteed. He punched in the number anyway. “Hey—”

Generic voicemail.

Foggy smoothed Ella’s hair down. Tried to, anyway, but it was still bushy. “It’s okay. He’s _really_ not good with phones. Don’t worry, all right?”

“Foggy, what if something happened to him?”

“Hey, listen.” He stared at her until her frightened eyes locked onto his. “You said he rescued you, right? Did you see how fast he could move?”

A nod.

“Was it maybe even a little bit scary?”

Another nod.

“Well, it’s even scarier for the bad guys. They can’t beat him, Ella. They just can’t.” He didn’t even consider the possibility that Matt might make a liar out of him. In that moment, he believed the words as much as Ella obviously did.

Her face cleared of worry. “He _was_ fast,” she agreed more confidently.

“Exactly. Don’t worry, all right? And I’ll tell you what. He’s supposed to meet me at our office at lunch today because we have some really important strategizing to do—”

“What’s strat-gizing?”

“Thinking. We have really important thinking to do. Together, like always. So even if he’s sleeping now, he’ll show up then and I’ll have him call you right away. Sound good?”

She hesitated only a second before rocketing forward and wrapping her arms around his neck. “Thank you, Foggy.”

 

Matt was late for the thinking meeting. Strategizing. Whatever. But that was probably fine. Matt tended to be late a lot. Foggy distracted himself doing some research in case there was a claim against Everett’s relating to Ella’s abduction. Which might not come up—who would sue? The kidnappers? Ella’s mom who had no idea what happened? Not likely. But the research got his mind off the fact that Matt late until he was late by forty-seven minutes.

Then Foggy gave up and called Karen, who was apparently building relationships with people at nursing homes not for a case anymore but because she was that kind of angelic person. “Is he with you?”

“Who?”

“Matt. Have you seen him?”

“He’s missing?”

“We had a strategy session for the Roberts case and he’s late.”

“Whoa, calm down. He’s late to a lot of things.”

“He’s an hour late and he’s not answering his phones and maybe I wouldn’t be freaking out so much but he promised Ella he’d—”

“If she’s safe, Matt probably is too.”

Foggy couldn’t believe his ears. “He’s a martyr, Karen!”

“Foggy. We’ve talked about the worrying thing. All three of us have talked about the worrying thing in like six separate conversations.”

“You’re right, Karen, of course, you’re a genius. I’m being stupid.” He hung up. No sympathy on that front. He called Mr. Burnham’s number next. “Um, hi,” he said, voice slightly high-pitched. “Please don’t tell Ella I called. Actually, could you, um, maybe distract her for the next hour or so? I sort of made her a promise that I’m realizing I might not be able to…keep.”

 

Matt - 5:00am

Matt was half asleep in that oversized chair when he snapped to his feet, hands forming fists before he knew what triggered his internal alarms.

Stone’s scent coupled with his heartbeat, drawing closer.

Moving silently, Matt crossed the room to the window and levered himself out, balancing on the ledge to slide the window closed again. Then he climbed to the rooftop and drew his batons.

Stone landed on the edge, arms raised. “I just want to talk.”

“Why did you come back?”

“Because Stick came back for you. Twice.”

Matt rubbed the back of his neck with a baton. “I told you. None of that was for me.”

“I spent ten years with him, Devil. I think I know him better than you ever could.” Stone moved closer. “Trust me. It was for you. He gave his life to save you.”

“That’s not what happened.”

Stone circled him, close enough to touch. “I was wrong before. There’s more to you, Devil. You should’ve bled out on the streets after our last encounter. Congratulations on still living and for earning my respect.”

He didn’t deserve congratulations for that. He’d be dead in his apartment if it hadn’t been for Foggy. At least Matt had finally managed to thank him.

“But then, you’re still so easily distracted. I thought getting the girl out of the way would help you refocus, but it seems I underestimated your devotion to her.”

“What?” Matt stood very still.

“What’s her name? Bella? She has some fire to her, I’ll give her that. But you’re not planning on using it. You’re just going to waste your time playing guard dog.”

Matt closed his eyes. “You ordered the kidnapping.”

“As if I needed to give an order. C’mon, it’s not like this city isn’t crawling with men who’d love a bite at a pretty little—”

Matt lashed out with his club and Stone let it hit him right on the mouth.

He stumbled back a step and gave a bloody grin. “Didn’t we do this already?”

“You stay away from her! You don’t even get to _touch_ her!”

“Oh, I don’t have to.”

Matt knew better than to throw his batons. He kept them firmly in grip and struck out with them. Stone blocked one blow, but the other hit him squarely on the shoulder. While he reeled, Matt threw a kick, pushing Stone further backwards. He batted the retaliatory knife from the air with a club.

Stone drew another knife. “I just wanted to talk.”

“Not happening.” Matt twitched one of his clubs to the side, sensed Stone’s head cock to follow the motion, and jumped with a roundhouse at Stone’s other side. He blocked, the flat of the blade pressed against Matt’s leg, but Matt twisted midair and snapped his other foot at Stone’s head. The warrior stepped smoothly aside and pounced as soon as Matt landed.

But Matt had been practicing. There wasn’t a knife-wielding criminal in Hell’s Kitchen he hadn’t targeted since Stone left.

Matt dodged or blocked each strike, the knives chipping away at the batons. One lodged in the wood and stuck; Stone and Matt dropped their weapons simultaneously and Stone grabbed another throwing star. In a flash, Matt snaked his hand up Stone’s wrist, twisting until the star clattered to the floor.

Stone jerked free with a nod of approval. “Didn’t like that one anyway.”

Matt kicked the star backwards—he didn’t need to leave it laying around for Stone to use later. He leapt forward with a yell just as Stone drew his sword.

The weapon sliced across Matt’s forearms, but his momentum drove him into Stone. They hit the ground together, still locked in combat. Stone’s nose broke—again—and something was swelling in his throat where Matt’s fist had landed. The knife was also shredding Matt’s arms but that was fine. The sword was no good at this range.

Until Stone drove the knife deep into Matt’s shoulder, leaving Matt with only one arm to defend himself. Stone dragged himself across Matt’s body and before Matt could move, he rested the tip of the blade under Matt’s eyes, dipping down into the socket.

“Now,” he rasped, “from what I hear, this won’t change anything for you. Then again, I bet it’ll hurt.”

Matt felt the ghost of Claire’s finger telling him where to best torture the Russian on her roof. Real fear washed over him.

But Stone’s heartrate spiked, not with adrenaline but some other emotion. He didn’t stab.

Matt held very still, letting Stone’s conscious thoughts work to justify his subconscious hesitation.

The pressure on his eye lessened minutely.

Matt snapped his head to the side, grabbed Stone’s sleeve, and pulled them into a roll together. The second Matt was on top, he sprang to his feet and dove away, curling into another roll to land farther. He sensed the knife flash but couldn’t slow his momentum in time; the blade sank into his back. He was still rolling—the blade was pushed in deeper.

And Matt couldn’t get back up.

Stone strolled closer, coughing blood. “That was fancy. I’m not sure how you did that.”

Matt turned his face out of the grit. He was lying on something else, something sharp that cut into his chest. Slowly, he tried to lift himself off it, slip his left hand underneath.

“Maybe Stick wasn’t so wrong about you?”

Matt’s glove found the weapon. The throwing star.

“I guess we both have things to teach each other.” Stone’s weight shifted slightly to his right leg, ready to strike.

Matt wrenched himself upwards and threw the throwing star, aiming just to the right of center mass. Stone leapt to the side, but the weapon still caught in his right ribs.

Though Stone sucked in a gasp and the scent of his blood spiced the air, that didn’t stop him from crossing the roof to Matt and kneeling at his side. He ripped off the mask. “Listen to me carefully, Devil.” His voice was strangled from the hit he’d taken to the throat. “Stick wouldn’t have given his life for a sniveling thing like you, so there must be more to you. His sacrifice _meant_ something.”

Matt tried to sit up.

Stone punched him in the mouth, knocking his head back. “Are you listening? It was worth it. So you tell me, Devil. Will you make sure his death wasn’t wasted, or do I need to do it for you?”

Matt clenched his teeth against the taste of his own blood.

“Because I’ll give you this one chance to be the warrior Stick thought you could be, or I’ll carve the warrior out of you myself.”

No, no. Because there was only one way to do that. “If you touch Ella,” he growled, “or anyone I care about—”

“Quiet.” Stone used the tail end of the mask to dab at Matt’s bleeding lip and ruffled Matt’s hair with his other hand. “It’s not too late. I can fix this. You can thank me later.” Then there was a new sound, a small sound, and a new scent. Something dangerously herbal. “No, no, don’t get up. I understand that’s your thing, but don’t get up.”

A heavy hand pressed firmly onto Matt’s chest, pushing him back, back, and down.

Then the needle slipped under his skin.


	7. Haven't Even Stopped the Bleeding Yet

Stone

The Devil of Hell’s Kitchen lay limp as a rag doll. It was so pathetic, Stone couldn’t stand to look. He got up and paced the small space of the apartment, but the restless movement failed to quiet the storm in his head.

Stick gave his life for _that_? That thing, twitching under the weight of the drugs he couldn’t even fight off?

Not that he wasn’t trying, judging by the sweat beading on his forehead, by the sharp breathing, by the flickering eyelids.

He just wasn’t a very good fighter.

Except for the undeniable fact that Stick had only spent a year with the Devil, and Stone had barely beaten him this time. The first time had been easier. Clearly, the Devil had been practicing and the improvement was obvious. That explained a lot. This warrior was virtually self-taught. Stick gave him the tools, gave him the direction, and that was all he’d needed to become—this.

Think what he would’ve been if the Devil had been fit to be a soldier. Then Stick would’ve stayed, and the Devil would’ve been undefeatable.

He would’ve been better than Stone. Half of Stone wanted to linger, wanted to build on the foundation Stick had left, wanted to make Stick’s sacrifice worth something. The other half wanted to run the Devil through here and now so he’d never have to face this lump of wasted potential, the ungrateful recipient of Stick’s greatest gift.

Stone picked up his sword, swung it twice, and looked at the Devil. He dropped the blade lightly against his throat, but the Devil was too locked in the haze of drugs to react.

So easy.

But Stick wouldn’t have wanted that. For all the Devil’s faults, the potential was truly unequaled, and Stick had never let anyone forget it. The Devil had been this standard Stone could only ever hope to meet. Now he’d met it—now he’d _crushed_ it—and the victory was bittersweet.

Oh yes, the Devil had potential. But he also had something else, something that had drawn Stick in, possibly—and it felt treasonous just thinking it, but—possibly against Stick’s own best efforts.

The Devil groaned again, eyes opening. Not that it would make any difference, according to Stick’s legends. Still, Stone took it as a sign the Devil was finally rousing.

Sure enough, the Devil pushed himself up on one arm, hovered there for a moment, and sank down again with his head tipped back. “ _Gahhh_.”

“Don’t move unless you want a worse headache.”

“Who…” The Devil’s eyes fluttered closed. “Stone.”

“Here.” He held out a cup of water.

The Devil accepted, pushing himself up again, more slowly this time, and he managed to stay almost upright. He drained half the cup. “What d’you want with me?”

“Could be several things. That depends on you, Devil.”

He tried to return the cup and it seemed to take significant effort for him to hold it out; after only a few seconds, his arm started shaking. Stone didn’t take the cup back, so eventually he dropped it on the floor. Could’ve been on purpose, though.

“I’m working on something in Thailand. Come with me.”

The Devil gave him a look of pure disdain. “No.”

“Not forever, Devil. Just long enough for you to remember what it feels like.”

“Stop.” He sat all the way up just to lean his head against the wall. “Stop trying to fix me.”

“Believe me, I wish I didn’t have to.”

“You don’t.” He aimed the words at the ceiling. “Stick walked away; you can too.”

“Stick came back. So have I.”

The Devil’s eyes closed again. “He didn’t come back for me. He came back for the Iron Fist and he came back to fight the Hand. I was just…there.”

“If it makes you feel all better to think that.”

“Where were you, anyway?” The Devil snapped.

A petty attempt at deflection. “The Chaste has always been under resourced compared to the Hand. Other members were on assignments around the world.” He paused for effect. “In other words, I was doing my job.”

“Yeah, well, my job never had anything to do with the Chaste. My only concern is this city. As for Stick, I had my chance with him. It’s over. So you may as well let me go.”

“It wasn’t a waste.” It couldn’t be. Stick was smarter than that.

“You tried to kill me before, so I don’t really get why you suddenly think I’m so worth it.”

“If I’d tried to kill you, you’d be dead.” Stone had simply been too disappointed at the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen. It had been easier to leave him gasping for breath while he bled out through his gills. But he’d survived, and that was impressive. Enough to pique Stone’s interest once again. “It wasn’t a waste,” he repeated. “What Stick did for you. I don’t care if you can’t see that yet. Come on.” He grabbed the Devil’s arm.

The Devil broke the hold and pitched forward, falling out of the bed and crumpling to the floor with a choked-back moan.

Fair was fair.

“Got your breath back?”

The Devil muttered something unintelligible. Probably a curse.

“I want to talk about Stick. I know you do too.” Stone examined the Devil’s face. “He put so much work into you, Devil. You must want to know more about him.”

“He means no more to me than I ever did to him,” the Devil spat.

“That so?” Stone asked. He paused, made sure he had the Devil’s attention. “Matty.”

He couldn’t hide his reaction, the way his whole body turned towards the name, the way a new layer of tension lanced through his neck and arms.

“See,” Stone said softly. “The two of you had something. I owe it to him to finish the work.”

 

Matt

Matt wanted to throw up. For multiple reasons, the least of which related to the way the world distorted every time he moved, and a feeling like a crowbar lodged behind his eyes, and the way he couldn’t really feel his legs. Far worse were all the things echoing around in his head. The sounds of the world, Stone’s voice, Matt’s own thoughts, the ghosts of Stick’s jeering.

_Matty, Matty, Matty._

_C’mon, kid. Show me I’m not wasting my time._

_You’re worse than your old man._

Stop.

_I’m proud of you, Matty. Really, I am._

“I’m glad he’s gone,” Matt said too loudly, just to get the voices to shut up. “I’m glad—” He broke off when Stone put two fingers on Matt’s chest, just over his heart.

“Why bother lying, when we both know the difference?”

Yeah, all right. Matt wasn’t going to be able to argue his way out of this one. Or fight his way. That didn’t leave many options. He took a moment to expand his senses around the room, focusing past Stone to the stale taste of the apartment, the distant sounds of his city waking up. If he just passed out again, would Stone leave him alone?

“Don’t you remember what it felt like? Having someone to teach you, learning something new each day, practicing until every part of you was sore and aching but knowing it was making you stronger, refining you?”

“Poetic,” he mumbled. “Go away.”

Stone cracked his neck. “I don’t know why you’re so resistant. Do you really think you couldn’t stand improvement?”

Objection—leading the witness. Miraculously, Matt kept the words safely in his brain.

“You rescued that little girl, but you couldn’t beat me. What if I’d gone after her myself instead of sending others?”

“No,” he said softly.

“She would’ve watched you be torn to pieces trying to save her. Think how frightening that would’ve been, think how much shame she’d feel for the rest of her life, knowing she was responsible for the death of her mentor.” He tilted his head. “Then again, I wouldn’t really know how that feels.”

“Stop.”

Stone sat down heavily on the bed beside him, so close Matt almost lost his balance as the flimsy mattress dipped. “I would’ve let you live. I would’ve sliced through your tendons so you could never walk again, but I would have spared your life, just so you could spend every minute thinking about how you failed, wondering where Ella was, what I was doing to her. Trying to find her, probably, trying to crawl your way back to her.” He shrugged, shoulders jostling Matt, who licked his lips against the upset to his equilibrium. “Unless you killed yourself first.”

“If you’re worried I don’t respect you…you can stop. I never tried to fight you for lack of _respect_.” Just general fury.

“Calm down, that’s not the issue. I’m just trying to demonstrate that even if you are the best fighter in Hell’s Kitchen, you should thank whatever lucky stars you have left that no one worse has come after anyone you care about. Which gives you two choices: resign yourself to everyone you love dying at some point due to your incompetence…or become better.”

Another day, Matt probably would’ve been able to anticipate his argument. Today, though, it was all he could do to stay upright. “Better…”

“Stick never even taught you knives.”

“Don’t need knives.”

Stone snapped his fingers right by Matt’s ear and the sudden distraction meant Matt missed the knife until the blade was stuck in the outside of his upper thigh, stuck up to the hilt. Twisting, he doubled over with his face jammed into the lumpy pillow, fighting not to scream.

“You sure?”

Matt kept his face to the pillow even after the danger of screaming passed, letting the rough fabric absorb his tears. He didn’t even know why he was crying, and now was not the time to figure it out. He concentrated on slow breaths, on bringing his awareness back to himself. He tried to skip his senses over the torn flesh and nerves, which didn’t really work, but the warm blood was almost soothing. Slowly, panting, he sat back up. “You really think…that’s the first time…I’ve been stabbed?”

“Just think about it.” Stone stood up. “And try not to die in this hole.”

“What?”

Footsteps receding, Stone’s sharp scent disappearing under the scent of Matt’s own blood. Going, going, gone.

Matt had to get home, get help. Couldn’t stay here; Stone might come back. So he got to his feet and immediately crashed back onto the bed, renewing the flow of blood from both his back and his leg. He swallowed bile. At least the bed was soft. He was fine. He tried again, with similar results.

New plan. He inched along the bed to the wall, braced his shoulder against it, and slid upwards to his feet. There. Still fine. Carefully, he kept one hand against the wall as he moved his foot forward, followed by the other, until he was balancing against the wall with just his fingertips. Then he let his hand drop.

Still upright.

Then he tried moving his right leg, and he moved it too far. The knife still embedded in his thigh screamed.

Matt regained consciousness on the floor, breathing shakily.

One more time. His arms trembled with exertion as he pushed himself up, dragging his leg until he could get it more or less under him.

New strategy: don’t use that leg.

Keeping his weight on his left, Matt balanced precariously. Of the many discomforts clamoring for his attention, he focused on them one by one, then let them pass out of his awareness. The pain in his leg. The pain in his back. The pain in his head. The nausea. The general blurriness of the world.

Stabilized, he managed three steps towards the door before he put it together. The warmth on his skin was coming from a window. The sun was shining. He was dressed as the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen, bleeding from multiple wounds, and the world outside was bathed in daylight.

 

Foggy

Matt’s apartment was empty and Foggy couldn’t tell if it had even been slept in. If only Matt were messier, he might be able to get a hint based off…something. Orange juice left out, a dresser left open. Something. Nope. It looked untouched, but it always looked untouched.

He almost jumped out of his skin when his phone rang and Matt’s name flashed across the screen. “Matt! I swear—”

“Foggy, help.” Matt’s voice sounded like it had been ripped to shreds. Almost definitely because Matt had been ripped to shreds. Or something.

Foggy grabbed his jacket. “Where are you? I’m on my way.”

“I’m…”

“Are you near Everett's?” He almost tripped coming down the stairs. Matt’s apartment had way too many and Matt insisted on roof access.

“No, I don’t…”

He waved his arm for a taxi. “Matt?”

“Sorry…” There was a pause. “I don’t know where I am,” he said, and his voice was clearer now. But it was also scared.

No taxis were stopping. “You know the location of every Thai restaurant in Hell’s Kitchen by scent alone. What do you mean, you don’t know?”

“I can’t…um…I think I’m drugged.”

Two years ago, Foggy would’ve dropped his phone in shock. Now he hung on harder. “Okay. We can work with that. Just tell me what you’re aware of.”

“Walls…” Matt’s voice was floaty. “Sunlight. People outside.”

Thanks, Matt. That narrowed things down to any inhabited area in this hemisphere. “Anything else?”

“Um…dry cleaning. Smells floral.”

Foggy was already pulling up Google maps and looking for dry cleaners. “You recognize dry cleaning by scent?”

“Comes in handy…”

That was weird and a question for another day. “What else?” Nothing. “Matt!”

“…What?”

For the love of—“Matt, don’t space out on me, c’mon.”

“Sorry. Um…pizza place. I think. And…oh, a hair salon. Maybe.”

“Okay, I think if found it. Some old apartment complex. Hold tight.”

 

Foggy kept him on the phone, even though Matt stopped responding after about three minutes except for the odd humming sound whenever Foggy paused for breath. “I think I’m kinda good at this whole triangulating thing,” Foggy announced upon reaching a dilapidated apartment. He was chattering, trying to keep Matt’s attention. “Which floor are you?”

“Top?” Matt guessed. A moment later, more confidently: “Top.”

Foggy wasn’t even out of breath when he reached the top floor. Chasing Matt all the time was improving his cardio. “Okay, I’m in a hallway. Lots of doors, but no one else is here.” He wasn’t sure if Matt could tell. “Can you come out?”

One of the doors cracked open.

Foggy darted inside and there was Matt, leaning against a wall and…whoa, that was a knife in his leg. Okay, cool. One of those days. “So, when you say drugged, should I be more worried about that or the thing in your leg?”

Matt tilted his head.  “Probably the drugs. I don’t…really know what they are.”

“Matt! You need a hospital!”

“No, I just need…I just need to go home before he comes back.”

Foggy mentally counted to ten. “Who?”

Matt’s head tilted further. “Oh, um, Stone. He came back.”

“He did this to you?” Moving closer, Foggy took a deep breath and ran his hands over Matt’s arms. He was bleeding there, too, but not as badly. “Don’t answer that. I’m getting you to the hospital.”

“Fogs, no, I can’t…I can’t…” Matt seemed to make a deliberate effort to mirror Foggy’s breathing. “I’ll be fine.”

“This isn’t a discussion!”

Matt was shaking his head unsteadily. “My decision, Fogs, and it’s not even on the list. So…” He pushed off the wall and made a good impression of someone capable of balancing. “S’you can’t make me.”

“Sadly, my friend, I think it would be _very_ easy to make you.”

“Do _you_ wanna deal with the questions about the…the knife and the…other one?”

“The other what?”

“I’m not going to the hospital.” He slipped into his closing-argument voice, which was dumb because he’d presented absolutely zero valid evidence. “Call Claire, call my mom. I don’t care.”

Foggy folded his arms across his chest and stared him down. Not that it did any good. But there was a conviction in his voice that probably wasn’t worth arguing about. He could get Matt home and call for reinforcements. “All right, fine. You win.”

As soon as he heard those words, Matt slumped back into the wall with a wince. “Okay. Good. Take me home. Please.”


	8. Don't Tell Me when I'm Grieving This Happened for a Reason

Foggy

He called Claire first thing and she agreed to meet them at Matt’s apartment. Next, Foggy had to call Marci for her car, but convince her to drop it off for him while she took a taxi back. He promised he’d explain later, which of course prompted her to try to nail him down on what “later” actually meant. Foggy only wriggled out of it by insisting that the secrecy involved a third party who was in no shape to consent to Foggy sharing his secret.

Which was all true in a very messed-up, when-did-my-life-become-this sort of way.

The apartment Stone was using wasn’t far from Matt’s, which was a creepy thing but also a good thing in this case. He’d just gotten Matt onto the couch when Claire arrived, letting herself in with a spare key that she somehow still had. She dropped her bag in the living room with a loud _thump_. “Home sweet home,” she muttered.

“You want water or something?” Matt shifted forward like he was trying to get up.

She pushed him back easily. “Not on your life, Saint Matthew.” Pressing her fingers to Matt’s throat, her lips moved wordlessly. “Heartrate’s too fast, about a hundred beats per minute.”

“Could’ve told you that,” he mumbled. “S’weird.”

Foggy gulped. “What’s it normally?”

“Just above forty if he’s rested.” She pulled a stethoscope from her bag and listened. “The drug is most likely affecting his brain. Foggy, get me an ice pack.”

He scrambled to obey. When he returned, she was getting Matt to swallow something with a bottle of water. He handed her the ice pack, when she dropped without ceremony onto Matt’s face.

He flinched, but didn’t try to move it. Instead, he sat quietly until his muscles unclenched and his head lolled back.

Claire held the pack in place. “I hate doing this outside of a hospital.”

“I know,” Foggy said guiltily.

“Drugs aren’t anything to play around with. I gave him something to sedate him, slow his heartrate back down, but I’m not used to doing this without a heart monitor, and _he’s_ not much use as a heart monitor when he’s the one who’s out.”

“Might not be too late to get him to a hospital.”

She rubbed at her temples. “Maybe. It would also stress his system. The most important thing is that he calms down and _stays_ calm. Can you promise me if he stays here, he’ll actually sleep?”

“I’ll make it happen.” Foggy promised. “I’ll call his mom.”

“He has a mom?” Claire stopped as if thinking about what she’d just said. “I mean…is she any good?”

“At being a mom? I don’t actually know. But she doesn’t put up with much.”

“Isn’t that a necessary requirement for being in his life?” She checked Matt’s pulse again. “Well, that’s probably the most I can do for him as far as the drugs are concerned. He needs to get his armor back.” She grabbed the first aid kit, turning her attention to the knife wound on his leg. “You know how all this happened?”

“Some creepy guy from his creepy past.”

Laughing, she started in on the stitches. “You know, that sounds about right.”

“He’s gonna be okay, right?”

Claire shrugged. “Physically? Sure. I’ll stop the bleeding, he’ll sleep the drugs off. But if this is someone from his past, I’m betting whatever problems _that_ triggers won’t just disappear.”

“They never do.” Foggy studied his best friend’s face. It was half-buried under the ice pack but still managed to look peaceful. “You know, I think I’m starting to understand his world, and then…” He didn’t need to finish that sentence, not with Claire of all people.

“And then,” she repeated absently, running her hands up and down the rest of Matt’s body. When she pulled away, her right hand was slicked with blood. She bit out something in Spanish and jerked her bag closer as she rolled him forward, more onto his side. “I found another one. Did he say— _yikes_. Are you saying he was walking around on this?”

The guilt was back. “Um. Yes? Just to get to the car. And then…to get up here.”

That triggered another string of Spanish as she started stitching it up. “Don’t let him walk on it for three days. I’d say a week, but it’s Matt and I know better. Tell him the three days is a gift and do _not_ let him cheat.”

“You overestimate my power.” Foggy scowled at the stupid, unconscious vigilante who was more trouble than he was worth. Not really, but some days….

“Where’s his wallet?” she asked, apropos of nothing.

“What?”

She shrugged again. “I have to stick around and monitor him, but I’m starving and it’s not fair to make you pay. So he’s buying. What sounds good?”

 

A couple hours later, she pronounced Matt stabilized and disappeared to get ready for a shift, taking Chinese leftovers with her. Foggy texted Burnham a picture of Matt (once he removed the ice pack, wiped away all the blood and covered him in a fluffy blanket) with the caption: “Tell Ella I told you he was just sleeping.”

There. Matt was recovering, Ella would be reassured. Foggy Nelson (and Claire) to the rescue. He was treating himself to a congratulatory beer when Matt stirred on the coach with a low, “Whoa.”

Foggy pounced on him, catching his hands before he could investigate any of his wounds. “Nope, nope, nope. You don’t get to move.” He was getting good at this help-the-vigilante-convalesce thing.

“Not moving,” Matt agreed limply. “Feels like I’m underwater.”

“Yeah, Claire knocked you out so your heart could settle back down, or something science-y like that.”

“Seems legit.” He stretched a little. “So I’m…in the clear?” He cocked his head at Foggy, a small smirk flitting across his face. “ _Even_ without a hospital?”

Foggy looked for something to throw at him that wouldn’t hurt. “You’re lucky Claire and I are on call for whenever you decide to get stabbed and drugged up and whatever else.”

The grin disappeared.

“Also, you’re not allowed to walk for three days.”

Matt’s expression became broody.

Foggy sunk onto the chair across from him, figuring he should get a bit more information before picking a fight. “Why were you messing around with Stone anyway?”

“He set up Ella’s kidnapping. He was hanging around Everett’s after I brought her back. I guess he was more interested in me.”

Foggy instantly felt terrible. For once, Matt hadn’t asked for any of this. “Geeze. Sorry.”

Matt shrugged. “At least now I know what he wants.”

“Which is?”

His sightless eyes flickered around uncertainly, and suddenly, Foggy _knew_ he wasn’t going to answer. Not truthfully, anyway. “He wants to fix me.”

Foggy shot back to his feet. “Wait, _what_?”

“Or something,” Matt said in a smaller voice that suggested Foggy might have overreacted. “It’s just, Stick worked so hard on me, and I’m not…I should be better.”

He wondered if Matt could sense his disappointment. “Matt,” he said tiredly. “We’ve covered this. Stick’s training—”

“I know. But I should’ve gotten to Ella sooner and I should’ve beat Stone. He just left me behind, Fogs, but he could’ve killed me. And if he killed me, there’d be no one to keep him from getting to Ella or—”

“There are so many things wrong with what you’re saying right now.”

“You already won, all right?” His voice turned defensive and Foggy definitely didn’t count that as a win. “Stick was bad. Child abuse. Whatever; big deal. Because everything I went through with Stick _did_ make me stronger. And, frankly,” he added, heaving himself upward with a glare towards the windows, “it lets me understand Ella in a way you never can.”

Foggy blinked. Was that really what he thought? Foggy opened his mouth, tried to figure out how to tear down that disastrous line of reasoning. But the truth was, Matt did have a connection to Ella based on histories that Foggy simply didn’t share—and he was shamefully glad of that. Childhood trauma had passed him by. He pressed his lips together. “So what, that makes it all okay? It’s not that simple.”

“ _I’m_ definitely not that simple. Forget learning to fight—I’d be locked up in an institution somewhere if it weren’t for Stick. How long d’you think the nuns would’ve put up with me and my—my _struggle to adapt_?” He spat the words like poison, and his expression suggested that they tasted like it too.

“You mean your mother?” Foggy asked pointedly. “That nun?”

“Well.” Matt’s voice quieted. “She wasn’t, ah…no. I don’t know how long she would’ve stuck around either.” He seemed to regroup. “The _point_ is that a lot of good came out of it. All the bad parts don’t mean it shouldn’t have happened at all.” He pulled at the threads of the blanket. “It’s like the tapestry thing.”

Oh, no, not the tapestry thing. Foggy put on his most patient smile. “The tapestry thing, Matt, works for big, vague, acts-of-God stuff that we hate but can’t do anything about. It definitely does not work for evil old men who ruined your childhood.”

“Only if your thread count is lower.”

“If my…what?”

“Thread count,” he repeated in his I-got-straight-A’s voice. “A higher thread count means more individual threads per square inch. Think of it as giving you more room to work with, more detail, more nuance.” He paused. “Makes everything softer, too.”

Foggy ran a hand through his hair. The tapestry thing was a stupid analogy and Foggy kind of hated it, hated how it seemed to take everything bad and say, “Hush now, just trust The Plan.” And yet…if Matt’s faith in The Plan gave him hope or peace or something, maybe it was worth it. It wasn’t like Foggy didn’t occasionally cling to the idea of karma or some other force at work. Even though he knew in his head that it didn’t make sense, he didn’t want someone else to come breaking that scrap of hope apart.

“You want to say something,” Matt said. “Just say it.”

Foggy walked to the kitchen. “Want some coffee?”

 

Matt

Apparently, Matt wasn’t supposed to be left alone until the drugs worked their way out of his system and Foggy refused to budge. “You don’t get to be alone until tomorrow after breakfast,” he informed him. “Claire’s orders. And stay off your feet!”

But Foggy had a life that didn’t revolve around Matt’s recovery, so he called in Maggie who arrived smelling sweetly of sweat—a long day spent helping other people. She kissed Foggy goodbye on the cheek, which was startling, and went to lean against Matt’s counter, staring him down across the room. The context was bizarrely different, but he felt the same odd mix of guilt and awe that she’d always inspired in him when he was a kid.

He was in trouble. “Hi, Mom,” he said weakly.

“What was it this time?”

“Stone.” He’d told her enough that her heart reacted upon hearing the name. “He’s gone again, for now, but he’ll be back. Probably knows where I live.”

“Does that worry you?”

Not really. “If he wants to kill me, he can. Doesn’t matter if he takes me out here or somewhere else.”

Her disapproval hit him in the face. “I don’t believe that for a second.”

“He got more training,” he said matter-of-factly. “I’ve tried to make up for that, but…” He waved his hand at himself.

“If half the things I’ve heard about your _training_ are true, the last thing you needed was more of it.”

“Oh, but it was worth it. Lots of good things, enough to make it _all_ worthwhile.” Matt gave a bitter laugh. “You know, I think I almost convinced Foggy I believe that.”

“I see.” Her voice turned unassuming. “I thought you were trying not to lie to him so much.”

Called out. “I was. I _am_. It’s just…Foggy and Karen have made it their life’s mission to tear down everything I thought I knew about Stick. I just need them to…” It seemed so selfish even to think it, when he knew they were only trying to help. “I just needed him to back off.”

“You have to be patient with him, Matthew.”

“He keeps trying to tell me what to think.”

“And hasn’t he been right?”

Matt clenched his jaw. “Sometimes.” He didn’t want to have this conversation; he wanted to sleep. But she was here, she was listening. “Ella’s going to get adopted.”

Something in his voice must have stopped her from bursting into celebration. “Is she?”

He just nodded.

“And what do you think of that?”

“I’m happy for her, obviously. Assuming the people who want her are good people. Which is a safe assumption, probably. I think I can trust Everett’s. I’m…I’m happy for her.”

“But?” Maggie asked softly.

Whatever he was feeling was too embarrassing to admit and he didn’t really know how to put it into words anyway. He tried to sink deeper into the couch.

There was the sound of her folding her arms across her chest; then she moved across the room and perched on the other end of the couch, over his feet with hers tucked beneath her. “Talk to me.”

There was only one way to put it that made sense, but no one seemed to agree. “It’s too soon.”

“For whom?”

“For Ella,” he snapped.

She didn’t say anything; probably raising her eyebrows or something.

He dragged his hand over his face. “Sorry. Sorry. I just…people keep trying to make this about me, and it’s not. It’s her life and I’m just trying to protect it, not…use whatever she’s going through to help me deal with my problems.” He wasn’t like Foggy, trying to force Matt to confront things by pulling Ella into his mess.

“Very noble of you, but surely you can see the parallels.”

“Can’t see much of anything.”

“Matthew,” she said a little more sharply.

Chagrinned, he ducked his head against the arm of the couch. “Sorry.” She waited. For what? Oh, she still wanted to know what he meant, why Ella’s adoption was too soon. And she was being so patient with him, as always, and full of grace. So he tried, he really did, to find words to match what he was feeling. “It’s just…I think it’s just…” He remembered sitting with Maggie in the basement of the church. She kept telling him he still had a calling and he kept trying to convince her that no, he’d lost his purpose, and now he needed the chance to just… “She needs time to grieve.”

“Mmm,” Maggie said.

“Because…” He took a deep breath. “She lost her mother. And her dad. And now everything’s changing so quickly and she hasn’t had the chance to even feel sorry about it.”

Maggie was quiet for a long moment. “Well, things may be changing quickly, but for all your similarities, your stories aren’t identical. She’s never had a good family and she’s been afraid of her father for most of her life. She’ll never stop grieving that, but it’s foolish to think the grieving hasn’t already started.” She waited a moment. “You, on the other hand, had an amazing father for nine years.” And there was the slightest scent of salt in the air now, but her voice didn’t waver. “And Stick did so much to help you, but he also taught you not to feel things. Didn’t he?”

“Yeah.” Matt wet his lips. “Yeah.”

“So, then. Maybe it’s not Ella who needs more time.”

No, he wasn’t—he didn’t need anything. Matt tried to shift under her weight. “Could I get some water?”

“Of course.” She was off him in a heartbeat and he rolled onto his side, pulling his knees up until his legs rested into a specific groove in the couch.

She returned with the water but set it on the floor next to his head. Probably knew he wanted it more for the diversion than anything.

“You’re wrong, though,” he said generally.

Instead of sitting on his feet again, she sat on the floor so she could lean into the arm of the couch, right next to his head. “Am I?”

“About not feeling things. I feel plenty. I wish I didn’t feel so much.” He braced himself for his confession. “But no matter how hard I try to see everything from Stick as a good thing, I can’t. Mom, I _want_ to hate him.” He listened, but she didn’t react. “Not very Christian, is it?” he insisted. “I thought we were supposed to praise God in all things, rejoice in all things.”

“Hmm,” she said vaguely.

“You disagree?”

“We praise Him at all times, yes, because the truth of God’s nature—His goodness, for instance, and His power—are unaffected by our circumstances. Rejoicing, though, is a bit more subjective.”

He settled into deeper breaths, focusing on her soothing scent. She was trying; he had to give her that. “Not really, if we’re commanded to always do it.”

“You’re thinking of Philippians?”

“Rejoice in the Lord always,” Matt quoted wearily. “I will say it again: rejoice.” He raised his eyebrows. “In case we missed it the first time, I guess.”

“The Apostle Paul was adamant,” she conceded. “You know he was in prison while he wrote the letter to the church in Philippi?”

“Let me guess—he was much worse off than I ever was.” He immediately wished he could take back the sarcasm. She was watching over him, healing him, for…how many times had they done this, now? “Sorry.” A weak apology; he was too tired to come up with a better one. Probably be better to just say nothing at this point. His apologies couldn’t possibly mean anything.

But she didn’t seem offended. Instead, she simply stroked his hair back from his forehead, every touch loving and soothing, and damnit if he didn’t press into it. “The word Paul uses,” she continued, “is the Greek word chairó. It refers to our response to God’s grace. It’s a command to _lean into_ that grace. In other words, to lean into every loving gesture God makes towards us.”

He closed his eyes. “And that applies to me…how?”                     

“God isn’t commanding you to celebrate any of the wrong that’s been done to you, Matthew. It would be cruel to demand that of you. By this definition, you can rejoice even while feeling anger or grief. We can acknowledge the wrongness while choosing to look for evidence of God’s love.” Her voice softened. “And once we find it, we rest in it.”

He was so tired and the couch was so soft and her hand was still caressing him. “Doesn’t sound very restful.”

“Doesn’t it.” A hint of amusement leaked into her voice.

“Don’t say it.” His heartrate was slower than hers, his breathing slower than hers.

“I didn’t say anything.”

There was a rustling sound as she bent to kiss his forehead, the last sensation he felt before sinking into sleep.


	9. Just Sit Here in the Ashes with Me

Matt

“I don’t even wanna hear it,” Foggy was saying. “You’re upright, you’re not drugged, you’re not bleeding through your clothes. You’re coming.”

Matt groaned loudly. Claire had cleared him for walking and Foggy immediately dragged him outside, heedless of Matt’s headache left behind by the drugs. They were on their way to see Ella, but Matt hadn’t exactly thought of how to deal with the fact that a six-year-old now knew both sides of his life. “Fogs—”

“Nope. Your secret identity, your problem. _I_ promised her you’d visit as soon as you could because _I_ had to deal with her giant chocolate eyes worrying about you. Now it’s your turn.”

“Chocolate?”

Foggy stopped. “Oh, yeah, she’s black.” Then he let out a startled laugh. “Supersenses can’t tell you skin color?”

Matt tried to glare through his sunglasses. “How, exactly, would they do that? I don’t know the color of your tie; you really think I can figure out what color your skin is?”

“I’m white,” Foggy said helpfully.

“Funny, I figured out that much by watching you dance.”

Foggy shoved him just as a pedestrian was walking by; Matt allowed himself to fall into a light pole and swallowed a grin while Foggy was thoroughly cussed out.

Almost five minutes later, Foggy pulled Matt roughly to his feet. “You suck.”

“At least I’m not the one pushing blind people over in the middle of the sidewalk.”

“Shut up and behave yourself. We’re about to interact with a small child.”

Speaking of, Ella’s heartbeat was like a beacon. He was so in tune to it now that he caught it long before he recognized Alice’s, or the sounds and smells of the rest of Everett’s. She was waiting for them outside, and Matt noted the instant she saw them because her heartrate sped up and she threw herself against Alice’s grip.

“Calm down, Ella! Stay away from the fence.”

She stopped trying to get free but remained poised on her toes until Matt and Foggy were safely within the confines of Everett’s lawn. As soon as Alice released her, she zoomed forward and Matt crouched swiftly, stretching his injured leg out behind him. The impact of her small body against his pulled at the stitching in his leg and back and stirred the embers of his headache, but he couldn’t possibly care.

“Matt!” She yelled directly in his ear.

He held her tighter. “Hey, little one.”

Her voice dropped to a whisper. “I kept your secret. But Foggy already knew. Is that okay?”

“That’s okay. Thank you for not telling people.”

“Can I tell Miss Alice? _Please_?”

He tried to look severe. “Don’t you dare.”

She gave an annoyed huff, but settled into his arms with no apparent intention of moving, ignoring the fact that Matt was effectively balancing in a squat on one leg. “Are you really okay? Foggy said you were sleeping.”

“I was. I got hurt, but then I got help.”

“You got _hurt_?” She pulled back and put her hands on his face. Her fingers tugged a little at his split lip and he smelled blood.

“Hey, hey. You’re gonna have to wash your hands now.”

“I’m sorry you got hurt. I’m sorry you had to save me.”

His heart clenched. “Ella, no. Don’t apologize for that.”

“But I broke the rules! And I didn’t do anything to stop the bad people. I…” She seemed thinking hard. “I did it wrong.”

He put his hand on her forehead and tried to smooth the creases there. “What do you think you did wrong?”

If anything, she just thought harder. Then she seemed to give up. “I let them take me.”

He sighed. Foggy had wandered forward to talk to Alice. Distracting her. So Matt held Ella more securely and shifted until he was sitting with his right leg stretched out in front of him. He put her hand against his pants where she could feel the bandage beneath. “Feel that?”

She recognized it instantly. “You’re _more_ hurt.”

“Ella.” He touched her chin. “It wasn’t your fault. I’m a grownup and I do a lot of the right things.” Lie, but she didn’t need to know. “I still get hurt. We all get hurt and that doesn’t mean it’s our fault. It doesn’t mean you weren’t good enough or strong enough. It just means…sometimes things hurt. Do you understand?”

Her head nodded. “You hurt.” At first, he thought she was confirming that he was in fact injured. But she went on. “You hurt other people. I saw you.”

He felt cold where he should be enjoying her warmth.

“Did you hurt them because of me?”

He couldn’t tell how she’d take the truth. Secure, knowing he’d protect her? Valued, knowing she was worth fighting for? Or guilty, because he’d hurt people on her account? “Ella, don’t…don’t worry about that right now, all right? All that matters is that I found you.”

She moved her hand back to his face and, before he could stop her, slid his glasses away. “Will you still find me when I have a new Mommy and Daddy? Will you still visit when I’m not here with Miss Alice?”

He blinked under her stare. “Yeah. If you want.”

“Good,” she said firmly, and put his glasses back more or less into place.

“Ella…”

“What, Matt?”

“Just…” He focused on her. There was no hint of fear, not in her voice or her body language or her scent. Nervousness, sure, but no fear.

Maybe she really was ready.

He cleared his throat. “C’mon, help me up.” He set her lightly on the ground and held out a hand.

She grabbed it and leaned all the way away, doing more to strain his shoulder than anything, but he got to his feet and neither of them let go as they walked over to join Foggy and Alice.

The latter scooped up Ella. “Can you let Matt and Foggy talk to Mr. Burnham for a second?”

“Duty calls,” Foggy said. “Ella, when I come back I want to hear about your new army of ducks.”

“She has an army of ducks?” Matt whispered as they entered Everett’s.

“Stuffed and rubber. Marci made a donation.”

Foggy kept insisting she’d gotten her soul back. This was finally some evidence Matt could accept.

Meeting them at the door, Burnham pulled them aside into a hallway that echoed annoyingly. “How’s the case coming?”

Matt was surprised; Burnham rarely asked about that, seeming to prefer to trust Matt and Foggy to do their jobs.

“We got the transcription back from her father’s deposition,” Foggy explained in a low voice—confidentiality and echoes were a bad mix. “It’s pretty damning stuff.”

“Any talk of a settlement?”

Matt wrapped both hands around the handle of his cane. “We’re moving for summary judgment. Basically, we point to his deposition and other admissible testimony and argue that there’s no genuine dispute over whether Everett’s should make reasonable efforts to reunite Ella with either parent. If we get it, the case will end with a verdict for us and we’ll never have to worry about settlements or trial.”

“When will you know?”

“Whenever Judge Main decides. Technically, discovery isn’t done yet, so he might wait on granting our motion.” He hesitated. “Especially because both parents’ lawyers expressed interest in deposing Ella.”

“ _What_?” Burnham exclaimed. The word bounced off the walls back at Matt. “What for?”

“To get more information, more perspectives, more facts. New York’s rules governing discovery are broad; very little is off limits.”

Burnham swore under his breath. Matt probably wasn’t supposed to hear that.

Foggy jumped in. “Judges usually try to balance between respecting those broad rules and protecting deponents like Ella from the potential negative consequences, like intimidation or embarrassment.”

“Or trauma,” Matt added more quietly.

“At the same time,” Foggy went on, “this case is pretty thin with regards to witnesses. The fact that Mr. and Mrs. Conway are separate defendants, and will more than likely be blaming each other, makes it even more important that the court considers a third party’s perspective.”

“Ella isn’t a _third party_ ,” Burnham interrupted. “She’s the _victim_.”

Matt tightened his grip on his cane. “But when most of the abuse occurred at home, she’s also the only other person who can tell the court what happened. Her teachers, neighbors, friends, they can speak to her injuries, but they can't say where she got them, unless we can manipulate their testimony into one of the hearsay exceptions.”

“We’re fighting this,” Foggy promised earnestly. “It’s just…we can’t guarantee that we’ll be able to keep her out of this.”

Burnham swore again. “All right. We’ll cross that bridge when we get there, I guess. In the meantime, we can’t move forward with the adoption process until this is all taken care of.” He lifted his chin slightly and Matt could imagine him directing a piercing glare at each of them. “You both understand that, right?”

“Yeah,” Foggy said. “We do.”

 

Karen

Karen got to the gym early, which gave her no excuse to avoid answering when her phone lit up with her dad’s contact. She stared at it, willing the screen to go dark again. When it finally did, it was only for a second or two before the screen lit up again with a voice mail notification.

She stuffed her phone into her jacket pocket. It was like he had no concept of the fact that maybe she didn’t want to drop everything and go take care of him when he hadn’t even bothered to pick up a phone when he learned about an attack on the business where he thought she worked.

Rolling her eyes, she tried to ignore the way her phone seemed to be burning a hole in her pocket. Like his behavior after the attack on the Bulletin was the only reason she didn’t want to talk to him. The other reason was that she _did_ want to talk to him, and she hated that. She shouldn’t want anything to do with him. And yet.

She was so relieved when Matt showed up, about five minutes late and limping, that she hugged him.

“Not that I’m complaining,” he said softly in her ear, “but what’s this about?”

She pulled back. “It’s just good to see you back on your feet after, you know…” She mimed the stabbing motion from Psycho.

Dropping his sunglasses and cane on a bench, he squinted at her. “What are you doing?”

“You know, the…” She mimed more intensely, but his look of confusion remained unaffected. “Oh, come on. Psycho was definitely out when you were a kid.”

“Uh, yeah, but the operative word here is _kid_. Wasn’t that a horror movie?”

“Never mind.” She dropped her hands. “What’re we working on today? If you make me shuffle again, I’m calling Claire. I know she doesn’t want you shuffling either.”

“I thought you liked the footwork,” he protested.

“I like you,” she corrected.

“I’ll accept that.” Grinning, he pulled off his sweatshirt again, but while there was definitely still plenty to admire, she also winced in sympathy at the brilliant bruises coloring his skin, the cuts across his forearms. “C’mon.”

She followed him into the ring, bouncing a little on the balls of her feet.

He spun her around, and it still gave her chills when she thought about it too much—this was the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen standing behind her. But it was also the dorkiest lawyer she’d ever met. “Joint manipulation,” he said, oblivious to her evaluation, “is one of the most effective ways to get someone to do what they don’t want to do. Which means you need to know how to get out of it.”

Wait, she only got to play defense? “You’re not going to teach me to do actual moves?”

“Like you need help manipulating people.” He took her wrist. “It’s more important that you know how to escape. I can teach you how to do it later.”

“I’ll hold you to that, Murdock.”

He started with emphasizing just how effective joint manipulation actually was, showing her the power of leverage, demonstrating how little pressure it took to bend someone over or drop them to their knees. When she was thoroughly freaked out, he moved on to showing her how to break various holds, often by twisting closer to her opponent.

“It puts you right within their range,” he warned, “so you’ll want to be ready to strike and get away quick.”

“Yes, sensei.”

He ignored that. “This next one is one of the most challenging. Took me years to figure it out.” His hands moved, angling across her wrist.

She waited, but the twist that should’ve doubled her over didn’t come. “Matt?”

He was just standing behind her, holding her hand.

“Is that it?” she tried to sound playful, because maybe this was some kind of come-on. But she kind of wanted to master this move first and kiss him later. She turned around.

His sightless gaze was directed at their joined hands and his cheeks were stained with tears.

“Oh, Matt,” she breathed.

He blinked a couple of times but made no move to wipe the tears away.

Slowly, she rotated her hand until she was holding his properly. She tried to give him a little tug to draw him closer, but his feet were firmly planted and he didn’t move.

Then he sniffed and let go of her hand, thrusting both of his deep into the pockets of his sweats. “Sorry.”

“Well,” she said carefully, “I’m not sure what just happened, but I don’t think you have to apologize for anything.”

Breathing in slowly, he shook his head. “Can we, um…”

“Wanna sit?”

“Yeah.” She’d been thinking of the benches by the lockers, but Matt lowered himself to the ground right there. 

“Oh. Okay.” She knelt in front of him.

Licking his lips, he pulled one hand out of his pocket to run it through his hair. Then he withdrew the other and clasped them together in his lap. “Sorry.”

“You don’t have to apologize.”

“Yeah, well, I’m thinking you didn’t come here for…” He sort of wrung his hands together. “This.”

Stupid of him.  “I came here for you.”

His breathing grew shakier. “I just…um. Give me a second.”

“You don’t have to say anything.”

“You don’t think you deserve an explanation?” The words came out bitter.

“I don’t think any of this is about me right now, actually.” Inching closer, she brushed her thumb against his cheek. “What do you need?”

“I…” He closed his eyes tightly. “Karen, I was a kid. I was older than Ella, but I was a _kid_.”

Oh.

“And I’m so thankful for everything he did. I really am. But I…” He squeezed his eyes tighter and lowered his head. “I shouldn’t have…I shouldn’t have needed any of that from him in the first place. I should’ve had a _dad_ and a _mom_.”

She forced the words out. “You’re right.”

His eyes opened. “And I’m glad he trained me. I am. But it didn’t…it didn’t have to be that…that bad.”

“I know.”

Another tear spilled over his lashes; she wiped it away. He said something so quietly she could barely hear it. “He hurt me. On purpose. I trusted him, and he…hurt me, and still I—” He cut himself off.

Before she could stop herself, she moved her hands to the back of his neck, pulling him forward until he was folded over her, his face pressed against hers. “I know, Matt. I know. It’s not fair.”

A sob wrenched its way from his throat, followed by another, and his fingers dug into her skin where he was holding onto her.

She sat there with him. Even when her knees ached and her back throbbed, she didn’t move, just stroked his hair and murmured that she loved him, taking his weight as he leaned against her.

With a grunt, he finally pulled back. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to…to fall apart like that.”

He didn’t need her forgiveness, but she’d been there before, sobbing and apologizing for it. She understood. “That’s what I’m here for.”

He gave a sad little smile. “I, um. I don’t really know how to be okay with this.”

He couldn’t just be referring to the physical pain Stick had caused. There were also the lies that must echo around his head, echoing in Stick’s voice. There was also the betrayal, and the guilt for feeling any of that betrayal in the first place. “It’s a little like that with my dad, maybe,” she began, feeling her way through the words. “I know how he treated me was wrong, so I shouldn’t let it affect me, right? But it still…it still matters to me.” She let her voice become stronger. “At the same time, his mistakes don’t have to define me any more than mine do.”

“How,” he said gruffly. “How do you believe that?”

She picked at a loose stitching in the mat. She wasn’t exactly an expert in this arena. But she was at least a few steps ahead of Matt. “Sometimes I don’t,” she admitted. “People help, though. You and Foggy. Mitch back at the Bulletin. You show me that people are still good and that I’m still good, and make me think…what’s that saying? The best is yet to come?”

“Do you miss him?”

Her throat tightened. “I don’t know.” But he needed an answer, and she couldn’t count on a conversation like this happening again any time soon. She shifted off her legs, stretched them briefly, and drew them to her chest. Buying herself time to think. “I miss him, yes, because he wasn’t all bad. The fact is, he used to be this huge part of my life, but now he’s not. I miss the good parts. But overall, no, I don’t really miss _him_.” She dropped her chin onto her knees. “I miss what he should’ve been.”

His eyes searched over her face. “I wish you could’ve known my dad.”

She hoped he could sense her small smile. “Me too.”

“I, uh…Stick. I miss what he should’ve been.” Matt repeated the words back a little mechanically, but that was far better than nothing. His eyes narrowed for a second; then he stretched closer to her, balancing with one hand on the mat while the other tangled up in her hair. “Thank you, Karen.” The breath from his words whispered over her lips a moment before his kiss.

This kiss was different than any they’d shared before. It was slow and sad and rhythmic, and neither of them were able to bring much warmth to it. But what warmth he did offer she soaked up, letting it wrap around her heart until she was strong enough to pull back just enough that she could tenderly kiss the tearstains on his cheek.

That seemed to break him. His lips trembled where they pressed against her skin. Lowering his head, he made his way to her throat where he tucked his head under her jaw, his wet lashes brushing against her every time he blinked.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The army of ducks is a reference to "These are the Places, They are the People" by Deerstalkerdeathfrisbee. Please read it - it's the cutest thing you'll read today!


	10. I'll Be Okay

Matt

_Resign yourself to everyone you love dying at some point due to your incompetence…or become better._

Cold air bit at his bare skin under the mask. Matt spread his senses outwards, hunting the city for the sounds of knives. The trouble with knife fights, of course, was that they tended to end quickly. He could barely identify the sound of a blade before hearing a body slump to the ground while the victory’s footsteps faded away.

He followed along anyway, stabilizing the wounded as best he could, gritting his teeth all the while because this felt like a waste of time and that…that was shameful. It was equally as shameful as prioritizing knife attacks when he was supposed to be protecting everyone.

Besides, whenever someone did draw a knife on him, he won in a flash: a quick parry of the first strike, then a simple twist to disarm the attacker. He went home each night with excess energy buzzing through his veins. More often than not, he swung by Fogwell’s on the way. He couldn’t really tell if he hit the bag harder to make up for whatever was missing in his training or as penance for a future where he failed to save someone he loved.

Either way, it didn’t really help.

 

Foggy

Judge Main dismissed their motion for summary judgment. Even Main’s crush on Matt failed to override the facts that discovery wasn’t complete and both defendants were after the same thing: deposing Ella.

“I don’t care,” Foggy announced at the end of the work day, speaking to the office as a whole including the wolf spider that liked to hang out in the kitchen. “We’re not allowing them to depose Ella. Let them sanction us! Not that Main would. He loves Matt too much.”

“That’s a lot riding on Matt’s charm,” Karen said skeptically from her desk.

“He’s a teacher’s pet, Karen, but he’s adorable about it. I have utter faith in his charm.” Foggy glanced at Matt, who was leaning diagonally across the doorway to his office. “I want that on record.”

His mouth twitched. “Appreciate it, buddy. I still think we should be ready for what might happen if my charm fails.”

“Blasphemy,” Foggy hissed.

Shrugging, Matt walked into the main lobby, pulled out a hacky sack, and threw it at Foggy. “We should still prepare for the worst, and you can start by telling us your next steps pursuant to we-love-each-other meeting requirements.”

“That’s not what it’s called,” Karen grumbled, but her heart was obviously not in it as she joined them.

Foggy rolled his eyes. “My day was good,” he reported carelessly. “I read stuff and noted stuff and talked to people. My next step is buying Main flowers and saying they’re from Matt.”

Karen plucked the hacky sack from his hands. “Stop disrespecting the meeting.”

“I move to sanction,” Matt offered.

“Sustained.” She cast Foggy a superior look. “I made a lot of progress on the Sanford case. The police records are full of holes, which I’ve cross-referenced against the witness statements with questions for follow-up.”

It was one of those moments when Foggy wished Matt could see so they could exchange impressed looks. He reached out and tapped Matt vigorously on the shoulder.

“What?” he demanded.

“I’m giving you an impressed look. You’re supposed to return it.”

Matt removed his sunglasses and made an expression that looked more like he’d been punched in the gut. Probably. Foggy had never actually been present for such an occasion, but he imagined that was what it looked like.

“I was thinking more awe and less surprise, but close enough.”

Karen couldn’t hide her grin. “Thanks, guys.” She threw it at Matt. Recently, she’d shifted her pattern from throwing it harder and harder and now threw it at more impossible angles. This time, Matt had to leap to the side, arcing his body to keep from colliding with her desk.

He still caught the stupid hacky sack. Because he was a superhero. “I’ve been going over Kyle Conway’s statements, which should give me direction for thinking about how to prepare Ella for her deposition, which I’ll start tomorrow. Besides that—”

“Hold on,” Foggy interjected. “I _just said_ I’m prepared to get sanctioned over this. We’re not letting them depose Ella.”

“Not without a fight, but we can’t pretend it’s not a possibility,” Matt said quietly. “We owe it to Ella to be prepared in case they win this. I won’t talk to her about it, I’ll just…think about it.”

What, think about how to handle the questions that would get thrown at Ella, all trying to undermine what she’d gone through, possibly to the point of changing her actual perception of reality? That didn’t sound like a brilliant idea, all things considered. “Fine,” Foggy said. “If you really wanna do this, I’ll do it with you.”

Predictably, Matt shook his head. “I can handle it. You should focus on getting those flowers.”

“Ha, ha.” Better not to push it for now, but no way was Foggy letting Matt sit there and think about how to protect Ella from a deposition on his own.

“Besides that, the NYPD is trying to tear down a new gang before it has the chance to really take root. I’ll help them out tonight, if I can.” Matt pocketed the hacky sack. “We good?”

“One last thing,” Karen cut in. “And this goes for all of us. I hope your schedules are clear this Saturday.”

Foggy had a Netflix marathon planned with Marci. “Why?”

“Because it’s Ella’s birthday.”

Foggy reached for his phone to tell Marci they’d have to reschedule.

 

The sun shone over Everett’s front lawn. A handful of blue and yellow balloons were tied to the fence and someone had set out picnic tables, draped with slightly faded tablecloths bearing a single tray of snacks each. Kids were milling around, mostly playing except for one sitting on the steps, crying while a staff member talked to them.

Foggy studied the scene, noting the contrast between this sparse affair and his own extravagant birthdays growing up. His house had always been packed with friends and relatives, filled to burst with balloons and streamers and tables piled high with food. “Huh,” he said. “I was expecting…more.”

“It’s pretty normal,” Matt assured him. “Everett’s is better off financially than St. Agnes ever was, but still. They can’t afford to throw big parties just because a kid has a birthday.”

Foggy shared a look with Karen. “That’s it,” he declared. “If she’s not adopted by this time next year, I’m doing it myself.”

“Adopting her or throwing a party?” she asked. “And doesn’t Marci get a say?”

“Both. And I’ll have you know, Marci will be thrilled to have a small child to influence without having to deal with pregnancy.”

“Not sure you should speak for her on that,” Karen warned.

“Not really sure Marci should have unfettered influence over a small child,” Matt added.

Foggy did the mature thing and ignored them, plunging into the yard. As soon as she saw him, Ella crashed into his knee, which would definitely be sore tomorrow.

“You came!” she bellowed.

He hugged her. “Wouldn’t miss this for the world. Not every day my favorite person turns six.”

“I’m _seven_ ,” she scolded.

“What? That’s impossible. Weren’t you just five years old yesterday?”

“ _Foggy_.” With a dramatic roll of her eyes (who was teaching her that?), she abandoned him, all set to rocket into Matt. But she paused when she caught sight of Karen holding his hand. “Foggy?” she whispered. “Is Matt married?”

“Um, no. That’s his girlfriend.”

She turned round eyes back on Foggy. “Matt has a girlfriend?”

“I’ll introduce you.” He led the way. “Hey, Karen. This is Ella. Ella, this is Karen.”

Karen held out her hand solemnly. “Hi, Ella. It’s great to meet you.”

Ella shook her hand shyly. “I’ve heard about you,” she said in a tiny voice. “You’re really pretty.”

“So are _you_ , Ella. And I’ve heard all about you too. Matt and Foggy say you’re really smart. And I know for a fact that you’re great at drawing, because guess what? I work with Matt and Foggy and they hung the picture you drew up in the office so I can see it every day.”

Ella beamed. “Really? I could draw another picture. Just for you.” Before Karen could answer, Ella turned her attention to a more urgent question. “Do you have a nickname? I do, and so do Matt and Foggy.”

Karen shook her head.

“I’ll think of something, then,” Ella said decisively.

“I can’t wait.”

Ella gave another nod, almost as if dismissing her, and turned to Matt, holding out her arms until he picked her up. “Hi, Matt! I’m seven!”

“What, did you think I forgot?”

“Foggy forgot,” Ella said, shooting a glare at him over her shoulder.

“Traitor,” Foggy muttered.

Matt smirked. “It’s okay, Ella. I’m just smarter than he is.”

“Hey,” Foggy said mildly.

“I know,” Ella said.

“ _Hey_ ,” he protested.

She put her hand on Matt’s cheekbone where the faintest bruise was evident. “Are you feeling better?”

His smirk faded. “Way better. I’m fine, Ella. Actually…” He shifted her weight. “I’ll probably be better if I have some cake. Is there cake?”

“It’s inside! I’ll show you!” Wriggling until he put her back down, she dragged him away.

Karen moved closer to Foggy. “How much does she know?”

“She knows he can fight and she knows he gets hurt a lot. I don’t think she knows about, you know.” He mouthed the word _Daredevil_. “Actually, I’m not sure how much she’s thought about any of this.”

“Does Matt have a plan for when she starts thinking about it? Asking questions, telling people things?”

Foggy looked at her incredulously. “For the record, you’re asking _me_ if _Matt_ has a plan? One, it’s generous of you to think he has a plan. Two, it’s weird you think he’d tell me.”

“C’mon, that’s not fair. He’s gotten better at telling us things.”

Foggy could concede that. “Point is, no, I don’t know. One of us should talk to him.”

She put one finger to her nose. “Nose goes.”

“ _You’re_ the girlfriend!”

“I don’t make the rules,” she said sweetly, and wandered off to find Matt and Ella.

They were impossible—all three of them.

 

The party started winding down sooner than Foggy expected. Because, of course, the kids had bedtimes. Karen, instantly popular with all the kids, was surrounded by a gaggle of girls that thoroughly intimidated both Matt and Foggy, who stood off to the side and tried to understand what was happening.

“They’re inventing some sort of game,” Matt was reporting under his breath. “Something about the Flower Queen.”

“Aw, that sounds cute.”

“Not really. Apparently you suffer pain and ostracization if you disobey the Flower Queen.”

“Wait, what? How do they even know what ostracization is?”

“Karen taught them. She likes teaching kids big words they shouldn’t know so they can surprise all the adults in their life. Like a ticking time bomb of shock. Of course, they keep saying ostrich-ization.”

“Kind of cute, then,” Foggy amended.

“Yeah.” Matt fell silent, probably still listening, but he wasn’t smiling anymore so maybe not. Foggy waited for him to say whatever was on his mind. Eventually, Matt tugged on his arm. “Could I talk to you for a moment?”

Foggy led him just outside the gate. The world was cool and surprisingly quiet, like all the New Yorkers had collectively decided to let Ella have this day without any extra distractions. He studied his best friend, who’d released his arm and was now fidgeting with the strap of his cane. “What’s up?”

“I need permission to do something on the list.”

Foggy felt his heartrate ratchet up and flinched at Matt’s answering expression. “Shh.”

“Didn’t say anything.”

“Not you. My dumb heart. I know you can hear that but I’m not panicking, I swear.” Foggy took three deep breaths. “Is it calming down? I can’t even tell.”

“It’s fine, Fogs.”

“Which, um, thing do you want to do?”

Foggy couldn’t quite tell, because he was wearing his sunglasses, but it looked like Matt was almost meeting his eyes. “I want to visit Elektra’s grave. And Stick. I don’t know where his body is, but I put a stone there, next to her, to…yeah. That was before I needed permission to go there,” he added quickly.

“No, I get it. But, uh, what do you plan on doing there?”

“I think…I think I need to talk to them.” Matt winced. “I don’t mean it like that.”

Foggy laughed uneasily. “Okay, good, because that would be…”

“Yeah. No, I just need to process stuff. This.” He waved his hand ambiguously.

Foggy studied him harder. “You sure?”

 

 

Matt

The cemetery felt different at night. The headstones always cooled more quickly than the ground, than the flowers, than the trees. Like pockets of cold marking each grave. Matt threaded his way through, trying not to step on anything hallowed, until he reached the plot of ground in front of Elektra’s grave.

Not that she was in it.

Still.

He nodded at the headstone. “Elektra.” Then he looked at the small rock beside it. “Stick.” He steadied himself with his cane. “I’m gonna be honest with you. You both really…messed me up. The hard part is, I think you both did it on purpose. Or at least…without caring.” He tapped his cane in Elektra’s direction. “You were under Stick’s orders, sure, but you enjoyed it. You enjoyed every minute of watching me struggle. Tempting me. Derailing my life.” He sighed. “The first time, at least.”

Looking back now, her twisted delight during their time at law school was obvious. He wasn’t as confident about the second time.

“When you came back, I think part of you really did want to change. I’m sorry I couldn’t…I wasn’t good enough to help you do that. But still, you shouldn’t have…you should’ve respected my life. I told you how much Foggy and Karen meant to me, and maybe I didn’t do a great job proving it, but I _told_ you and you didn’t even care. And you should’ve.” He swallowed. “You should’ve cared.”

And maybe she really had cared about _him_ , individually, but that wasn’t enough. Because as much as Stick would’ve hated it, Matt’s life had stopped being confined to just Matt the second he met Foggy Nelson, and the expansion of Matt’s universe had continued ever since.

He turned to the little rock. A pathetic monument for such a great warrior. “You deserved better, Stick. I’m sorry I was too late. I’m sorry I couldn’t save you.” He paused to regain control of his emotions. Stick wouldn’t have wanted an emotional goodbye. “But you shouldn’t have treated me like that. I don’t think you really knew better, so I guess I can’t blame you.” He paused again and couldn’t stop the anger from tightening his voice. “But if you’d treated Ella the way you treated me, I would’ve…” He wasn’t allowed to kill and he couldn’t think of anything else that would satisfy.

He let it go. He was just talking to a rock anyway.

“I’m thankful for some of what you taught me. For teaching me to control my senses, and to meditate, and to fight.” He listed each with careful precision. “But you shouldn’t have fed me your lies about friends and caring about them. You shouldn’t have said any of the things you said about my dad. You shouldn’t have made me…” He squeezed his eyes shut. “D’you know how much _help_ I need just to figure out how to _feel_ things? Still, even now? It’s not normal. And it’s your fault. You shouldn’t…you shouldn’t have done that.”

This was exhausting. But he was almost done. Matt licked his lips. “Both of you meant, uh, a lot to me. Obviously. And I miss you.” The truth of that statement echoed in the steady beating of his heart. “But more than that…I miss what you should’ve been.” He blinked. “Okay.” Then he turned around. “I’m done.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys. All of your comments are so incredible and have inspired so many details (big and little) of this fic. Seriously, I'm so blessed by the amount of thought and insight you're giving to this little story.
> 
> I promise I'll respond to them, but I can't promise I'll do that before tonight since I have a giant assignment due. But in the meantime, please enjoy this penultimate chapter!


	11. Epilogue

Matt

The man was rich and drunk and apparently stupid, walking through this part of town wearing clothing that smelled so strongly of money. But the five men who were tailing him moved with a kind of purpose that Matt didn’t usually sense from thugs. This was a premeditated attack and the target was oblivious.

The upside was, about four of the attackers had knives.

The target kept going, turning down a narrower sidestreet, listing to the right once in a while as his balance betrayed him. Two of the five men split off, jogging lightly, angling to cut off escape. Then— _idiot_ —the target pulled out his cell phone.

Time to move.

Matt dropped down behind the nearest stalker and wrapped the man in a headlock before he could make a sound. Tightening his grip, he listened to the breathing, the heartbeat, until the man slipped into unconsciousness. His knife clattered to the ground.

One of his companions turned at the sound and let out a shout.

Wonderful. Matt kicked the knife behind him and drew his batons.

The drunk made a frightened sound and started running, or lurching, or whatever. He didn’t even try to call the police, which was selfish on his part, though Matt didn’t mind. He was also, however, running straight into the ambush.

Matt threw a baton at the nearest attacker, who was too slow to keep it from cracking against his skull. Sprinting, Matt dodged the second man’s attack, a quick stab with his knife that was actually impressive, and overtook the drunk, pushing him through a gap between two buildings. “Go that way if you wanna stay alive.”

The drunk said something stupid and incomprehensible and took off at a stumbling gait.

The remaining three men were closing in; the one who’d taken a baton to the head was recovering. Matt spun his remaining baton and cocked his head, scanning for weak links.

The one directly in front had a bad knee.

The one on the far right didn’t have a knife.

Good enough.

Matt rolled forward and kicked the bad knee; the man went down with a choked caterwaul. Matt blocked the first knife with his baton, accepting a punch to the shoulder from the man without a weapon because better a fist than a blade. Then the knifeless man grabbed Matt’s collar, trying to wrestle him.

Bad move. Matt flipped out of his hold, catching the man under the chin with the back of his boots. The man hit the ground but Matt’s forward momentum didn’t give him the opportunity to dodge the next knife, which slashed across his chest.

Stupid, gratuitous flip. Should’ve gone for something less fancy.

Another knife stabbed into his arm. Matt kicked forward, but instead of dodging the blow, his enemy used the blade to block Matt’s leg, tearing into his pants and his skin.

Snarling, Matt dropped to the ground and punched at his knee, feeling the joint strain beneath his fist. Sensing another attack from behind, he twisted, parried the punch, but the punch was followed by another knife strike at the same time as the guy on the ground behind him threw his weapon, which sunk into Matt’s shoulder.

Matt hissed in a breath through his teeth. At least the guy on the ground didn’t have a weapon anymore. He focused on the man still standing. Matt jumped up, too high on adrenaline to pay any attention to the pain, and parried the next stab, grabbing the man’s wrist and jerking him closer, ramming his club into his throat. With a gurgle, the man dropped to his knees.

Then, to prove that spinning kicks actually were worth it, Matt jumped, twisted, and kicked out, striking the man precisely in the temple. He hit the ground unconscious.

Slowly, Matt turned towards the two men clutching their knees, tasting their fear. He took his time advancing on them, relishing the way the fear turned into panic. Two quick blows to the head and they joined their friends unmoving on the ground.

Matt called the police and was about three blocks away before it really caught up to him that he still had a knife stuck up to the hilt in his shoulder and…ugh, that was going to be a hard wound to fix. Also, it kind of hurt.

Then again, he was close to the church. At least, he thought. He’d added Maggie’s name to his burner phone, but hadn’t had to call her for this kind of help yet. Or…hadn’t been able to bring himself to calling her, to disrupting her when he wasn’t really so desperate. It was easier to go home, take care of the worst of things himself, and have her come inspect his work later. Besides, he’d lasted so long without her; it seemed greedy to demand her attention now when he knew he could handle the injuries alone.

But he wasn’t so sure he didn’t need help with this one. Besides, she also kept insisting—along with Foggy and Karen, like a well-trained chorus—that Matt was _supposed_ to ask for help.

So he reached unzipped his pocket with one hand and toggled down to the third number. Past Claire, past Foggy. Karen’s was the fourth—he hadn’t felt comfortable adding her name to the list, but she’d discovered that he was leaving her out of the fun keep-Matt-from-dying-club and badgered him until he gave her the fourth slot.

He held the button to speed-dial Maggie and tried not to let the anticipation of hearing her voice lull him into a false sense of security. He was still kind of bleeding a lot.

But hearing the voice on the other end was like finding himself thrown into an icy river. “Hello again, Devil.”

Matt switched the phone to his other ear. “Stone?”

“Thought I’d add myself to your contacts while you weren’t looking. Which is, I gather, always. Whose spot did I replace? Your girlfriend’s? Tell me, does it excite her, when you use _this_ phone to—”

Matt hung up. But before he could call Maggie, it rang again.

He shouldn’t answer. He shouldn’t. “What do you want?”

“Or is it the other kind of call?” Stone went on as if he hadn’t been interrupted. “Have you fallen and can’t get up? Well, I hate to assume things, but I’d probably be more helpful with that than your girlfriend. What was it? Don’t tell me it was a knife.”

Matt said nothing.

“Oh, it _was_. Isn’t that humiliating. How long did it take you to recover from mine, by the way? Should’ve been a week, but I bet you weren’t that patient. Probably infuriated anyone who actually cares about you, right? Well, if you let me fix you up, I promise not to judge. Can anyone else on that list of yours say the same?”

Yeah, actually. Maggie wouldn’t judge him.

“This is your fault, after all. I _did_ offer you the chance to prepare for this exact kind of thing, and you didn’t take it. I’d say that means you asked for it, and they’ll figure that out for themselves soon enough. But if you want to disrupt their lives instead of handling your own stupid mistake, I won’t stop you. Though I could. Easily. And then I could hunt them down and do whatever I wanted to them, and there wouldn’t really be anything you could do to stop me.” He paused. “Bleed on me?”

Matt tentatively rolled his shoulder, felt the knife shift, felt blood soak his shirt. “You’re saying…you’d help me?”

“Just tell me where you are, Matty. I’ll be right there.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YOU ALL ARE AMAZING. Thank you for helping me discover these wonderful characters! Seriously, if feels like I'm writing this with you rather than for you. Is that cheesy?
> 
> ALSO. Between your ideas and the fact that I have a thing for trilogies...you might want to stick around. :)

**Author's Note:**

> Work and chapter titles from "Not Right Now" by Jason Gray. Warning: heartbreak ahead.


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